Myanmar - Entrepreneurship and Technology Leapfrogging in Least Developed Countries A Study of Myanmar Tech Startups

Entrepreneurship and Technology Leapfrogging in Least Developed
Countries:
A Study of Myanmar Tech Startups
By
NWE, Su Sandar
52118611
May 2020
Master’s Thesis
Presented to
Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University
In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of
Master of Business and Administration

Su Sandar Nwe: 52118611 Date. July 12, 2020
Table of Contents
Certification Page ............................................................................................................. 4
Acknowledgements ............................................................................................................ 5
Abstract ............................................................................................................................. 6
Chapter I: Introduction..................................................................................................... 8
Chapter II: Literature review ......................................................................................... 12
2.1 Technology Startups ............................................................................................. 12
2.2 Technology Leapfrogging and Catching Up in ICT ............................................. 14
2.3 Entrepreneurial Readiness/Self-efficacy............................................................... 17
2.4 Technology Readiness .......................................................................................... 18
Chapter III: Research Methodology ............................................................................... 21
3.1. Data Collection .................................................................................................... 22
3.2. Data Analysis ....................................................................................................... 25
Chapter IV: Background: The Evolution of Mobile Generation Technology in Myanmar
........................................................................................................................................ 27
Chapter V: Startups in the Mobile Internet Infrastructure in Myanmar ........................ 34
5.1 Phandeeyar: Is it important that these startups are in an incubator? ..................... 34
5.2 Seedstar ................................................................................................................. 34
5.3 Bindez ................................................................................................................... 35
5.4 Flexible Pass ......................................................................................................... 36
5.5 GoP ....................................................................................................................... 37
5.6 Mmtutor ................................................................................................................ 37
5.7 Zeddite .................................................................................................................. 38
5.9 Project Win ........................................................................................................... 39
5.10 Potato Creative.................................................................................................... 40
5.11 E-voucher ............................................................................................................ 40
5.12 Pearl Yadanar...................................................................................................... 41
5.13 Ed-tech ................................................................................................................ 42
5.14 RecyGlo .............................................................................................................. 42
5.15 Expa.ai ................................................................................................................ 43
5.16 Bards ................................................................................................................... 44
5.17 Next Code/Book Doctor ..................................................................................... 44
5.18 JobDoh ................................................................................................................ 45
5.19 Concept X ........................................................................................................... 45
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5.20 Shopmyar ............................................................................................................ 46

5.21 Binary Lab .......................................................................................................... 47
5. 22 CarsDB .............................................................................................................. 47
Chapter VI: Discussion................................................................................................... 48
6.1 The Emergence of Leapfrog Entrepreneurs .......................................................... 50
6.2 Entrepreneurial Work Experiences and Education ............................................... 52
6.3 Entrepreneurial Self-efficacy ................................................................................ 55
6.4 The Importance of Accelerators/Incubators ......................................................... 58
6.5 Technology Readiness of Market ......................................................................... 61
6.6 Proposed Conceptual Framework ......................................................................... 65
Chapter VII: Conclusion................................................................................................. 67
7.1 Conclusion and Recommendations....................................................................... 67
7.2 Limitations and Further Research ......................................................................... 70
References ....................................................................................................................... 72
Appendices ...................................................................................................................... 76
2
List of Table
Table 1. List of Companies Interviewed ......................................................................... 24
List of Figures
Figure 1. A Regional Comparison of Smart Phone and 3G+4G Penetration Rate ......... 31
Figure 2. Challenges of Startups in Myanmar ................................................................ 49
Figure 3. The Visualization of Founders’ Background Knowledge, Self-efficacy and
Emergence of Startups at the Time of Technology Leapfrogging.......................... 57
Figure 4. Types of Support from Accelerators to Technology Startups ......................... 60
Figure 5. The Causes of Low Level of Technology Readiness of the Market, which is a
Key Challenge Facing Startups in Myanmar .......................................................... 65
Figure 6. The Visualization of Supply and Demand Effect with the Modifier Technology
Readiness of the Market ......................................................................................... 66
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Certification Page
I, Su Sandar Nwe (Student ID: 52118611) hereby declare that the contents of this
Master’s Thesis are original and true, and have not been submitted at any other university
or educational institution for the award of degree or diploma. All the information derived
from other published or unpublished sources has been cited and acknowledged
appropriately.
NWE, Su Sandar
2020/05/25
4
Acknowledgements
I want to express my special thanks to Professor Rian Baise-Zee, who supervised
and guided me through the whole thesis. Without his guidance and suggestions, my thesis
would not be complete. Furthermore, I would like to thank all the technology startups
founders, co-founders, and C-levels who gave their valuable time to interview and
contribute to this thesis. Finally, I would like to thank my friends and family who gave
me emotional support during my journey of writing this thesis.
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Abstract
Technology leapfrogging, especially internet and mobile technology leapfrogging,
has brought noticeable changes in the least developed country of Myanmar. This study
explores cases where technology leapfrogging leads to innovation opportunities for
startups, how they began their business, and the challenges faced during the leapfrogging
period. The study proposes the framework of tech-startups (supply), technology readiness
of the market, and innovative or imitative/localized opportunities of the market (demand)
for startups. Capturing the whole image of the startup's environment, five elements are
analyzed to reflect the focus of the study. They are the emergence of leapfrogged
entrepreneurs, the background of entrepreneurs' work experiences and education,
entrepreneurial self-efficacy, the importance of accelerators/incubators, and technology
readiness of the Myanmar market. By identifying the characteristics of leapfrogged
entrepreneurs and their characteristics based on education and work experiences
combined with entrepreneurial self-efficacy, talented entrepreneurs bring new
technologies to introduce to the market and set up their startups. Additionally, they get
support from accelerators to drive their startups to be successful as a supply-side.
Technology readiness is intermediary to identify innovation or imitation/localization of
the market as a demand side. The exploratory qualitative approach with an in-depth face-
to-face interview is followed in this study. The study was conducted by interviewing
startups running various tech-based businesses, such as software solutions, branding, and
digital services, e-commerce, payroll apps, service platforms such as payroll, education,
tours, household services, waste management system, and vlog businesses. The main
finding of this research is that with sufficient technology readiness of the market,
leapfrogging in information and telecommunications technology will lead to innovation.
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Otherwise, it will lead to imitation and localization due to a lack of digital literacy, low
education level, and language barriers. The findings reveal that most entrepreneurs have
international education and work experiences that enable innovative ideas from other
countries to utilize in Myanmar. Even though some founders do not have international
education and work experiences, the research expresses that they have the ability to
explore and learn online so that they can catch up with new technology. Later they have
international exposure through their startups by attending conferences and workshops in
other countries. Furthermore, the study has found that all founders have entrepreneurial
self-efficacy with a strong spirit to run their business, although the market has a low
technology readiness level. It has found out that they sacrificed their potential to develop
business in developed countries and came back to their home country to introduce their
products or services, and believing that their startups would scale up when people catch
up with technology. Accelerators support them by providing mentorship, networking, and
co-working space. Although the market opportunities are there and Myanmar has talented
and technologically savvy entrepreneurs, their boundaries of innovation and market are
narrow. Therefore, most startups cannot capitalize on current opportunities. However,
some entrepreneurs are successful due to their service and target market's choice by
combining the necessary infrastructure to implement a narrow market opportunity. Thus,
technology leapfrogging has a specific positive effect on tech startups, but it does not lead
to market innovation.
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Chapter I: Introduction
Generally, the term leapfrogging is used mostly in businesses, economics, and
technology. Tarjanne (1998) says that leapfrogging has a revolutionary impact on how
the world and its citizens communicate. Leapfrogging refers to “a non-continuous
advancing mode, in the course of which some phases or steps are skipped” (Chen & Li-
Hua, 2011). Among different kinds of leapfrogging, technology leapfrogging is the most
obvious factor to develop country’s economy, which can easily be seen in both developed
countries and developing countries, including Myanmar. Advanced technology is
introduced and utilized in developed countries, especially internet technology while
developing countries still do not get full access to the internet.
When internet technology is adopted quickly in developing countries, Davison et
al. (2000) mentions that developing countries have an incompatibility between
technology and culture. Lee (2001) instead argues that the rate of diffusion varies
according to the absorptive capacity of developing countries, and some developing
countries fail to utilize technology due to inability to exploit advanced technology and
people are illiterate about this technology. Furthermore, lacking human capital
investment affects the adaption rate of technology slower (Lee, 2001). Also, they have a
lack of economic or human resources to acquire this technology. The same research has
shown that education plays an essential role in catching up technology leapfrogging and
to enhance technology readiness.
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Information and communication technology (ICT) has a vital role in leapfrogging
because ICT enables many innovations. As the price of ICT is falling, investment in
telecommunication infrastructure in developing countries is a lot cheaper and accessible,
even in the least developed countries. So, there is a potential for innovations in developing
countries once ICT infrastructure is in place. Thus, the internet and mobile technology
are interesting areas to study leapfrogging in the least developed countries. When people
get internet and smartphone, their daily life and behavior change according to the
technologies that are accessible for them. Their buying habits may change from grocery
stores to online stores, social media can be adopted for communicating with other people,
and companies can create new innovative business opportunities through internet
technology. By utilizing the resources of internet and mobile technology, the setup cost
is cheap, and many startups entered into the digital environment with their innovative
products and services such as e-commerce, fintech, healthcare, education, payment
system, logistics, and supply chain, transportation, wellness, beauty. According to
Gilmore (2017), one main issue for startups in the least developed countries is funding
since capital markets and financial institutions are underdeveloped. This makes it difficult
for startups to raise fund. However, internet-based startups need less cash than other
businesses, and many venture capitalists pay attention to invest in a new market like
Myanmar. In the case of the least developed countries, research on the case of startups is
limited.
The country, Myanmar, is chosen to study how startups survived and how it
became an opportunistic place for entrepreneurs to leapfrog and exploit the internet and
mobile technology to run their business successfully. It is an excellent example of
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leapfrogging since Myanmar leapfrogged mobile-generation technology in 2013. Within
three years, mobile diffusion rate reached to 89.26% in 2016 (YSX, 2018), and it has the
same mobile infrastructure (3G,4G) as developed countries. The technology and
affordable smartphones from China enable the public to leapfrog computers in favor of
smartphones. Many startups joined the digital business world when seeing the
opportunity and power of the internet and mobile generation technology. In 2013, telecom
companies started competitions for startups and organized accelerator programs to attract
the interests of potential startups founders. Some Myanmar people studied and worked in
foreign countries, but they came back to their home country with an innovative idea to
run technology startups when they knew opportunities in Myanmar. Some of them imitate
or localize foreign business models, others find market gaps or problems in Myanmar
then capitalizing on it by providing original solutions.
Myanmar needs to develop its economy, and startups play a crucial role in driving
the Myanmar economy to increase its GDP. Myanmar government encourages startups
by opening up Myanmar innovation center and incubators/accelerators support to develop
startups. Some co-working spaces appeared to boost startups' environment. Nevertheless,
some infrastructures are still lacking, although it has leapfrogged to internet and mobile
generation technology. This study explores cases where technology leapfrogging leads to
innovative opportunities for startups. However, a counterargument is that if other
elements of national infrastructure are not there yet (for instance, transportation, finance,
and education), the market cannot create demand for innovations based only on ICT, so
that leapfrogging ICT does not lead to the adoption of innovation. Leapfrogged
entrepreneurs do appear in this situation having the background of international education
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and work experiences with strong entrepreneurial self-efficacy as a characteristic of
leapfrogged entrepreneurs. Also, accelerators play an important role to emerge many
startups by supporting them with mentorship, networking opportunities and co-working
space in Myanmar. Although entrepreneurs have skills, ability and support, they fail to
get demand of the market. The study explores a number of cases of how leapfrogged
entrepreneurs founded their startups and the challenges they faced during the period of
leapfrogging.
The objectives of this research are to identify the characteristics of leapfrogged
entrepreneurs in the least developed economies who support technology leapfrogging, the
challenges they faced, the success they gained and to assess whether technology
leapfrogging leads to market innovation in Myanmar. There were very few research to
contrast as it is a new research area. The specific research questions of this study are:
what are the characteristics of entrepreneurs of startups in Myanmar which are using
state-of-the-art ICT infrastructure to develop innovations? How successful are they, and
what challenges do they encounter? Does technology leapfrogging lead to market
innovation in Myanmar?
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Chapter II: Literature review
2.1 Technology Startups
According to Mulas et al. (2018), a startup is defined as “a newly established
business venture that is in its first stages of operation and the report focuses on tech
startups, which are those that have a technological component. These startups are
typically designed to scale up quickly”. The same research explains the startup ecosystem
is that “the combination of people, startups at various stages and other stakeholders and
organizations supporting or connecting to these startups, interacting in multiple
dimensions to create and scale new startup ventures” (Mulas et al., 2018). Song et al.
(2008) describes that eight factors in founders are correlated to the performance of
startups such as supply chain integration, firm age, size of the founding team, market
scope, founders’ marketing experiences, financial resources, and founders’ industry
experiences.
Vesper (1990) mentions that less than one-third of startups are successful enough
to turn into a company, and many of them fail in the very early stage. The failure of
startups is because of lack of finance, lack of technology, team management problems,
lack of business knowledge and startups problems (Núñez, 2007). Only some of them are
successful and turns into companies (Martinsons, 2002). Hudson & Khazragui (2013)
suggest that startups need to pass over the stage of a black box called “the valley of death”.
Salamzadeh & Kawamorita (2015) highlight that there are three stages in the startup's life
cycle: bootstrapping stage, seed-stage, and creation stage. In the first stage, the authors
explain that entrepreneurs need to initiate a set of activities to change their idea into a
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profitable business and they need to find team members to form a team, asking family
and friends for their investment in the idea, think the risk of uncertainty or use personal
funds to show product feasibility, customer acceptance, cash management capability, and
team building (Brush et al., 2006). At this stage, angel investors tend to invest, and
Harrison et al. (2004) argues that “bootstrapping is a way of life in entrepreneurial
companies”.
The next stage is the seed stage in which accelerators and incubators involve
supporting startup mechanisms, and many startups find that opportunities by teamwork,
developing a prototype, seeking support, and investment from accelerators and incubators.
Salamzadeh (2015) mentions that the seed stage is construed as highly uncertain, and
startups invest seed capital to produce products or services (Manchanda & Muralidharan,
2014), and many startups fail at this stage. The authors mention that if they cannot find
seed money, then they invest their own money, but the growth level is slow. For startups
who receive investment and the vast amount of seed money can be successful and turn
into profitable companies. The final stage is creation stage and, in this stage, a firm is
formed and venture capitals fund organization (Salamzadeh & Kawamorita, 2015). Then
the authors describe some common challenges that startups faced, financial challenge,
support mechanism, human resource challenges, and environmental elements.
According to McKinsey (as cited in Friedl & D’hauwers, 2014, p. 6) consultancy
firm’s forecast shows that Myanmar would increase the size of its economy from $45
billion in 2010 to more than $200 billion in 2030. The authors argue that because of
opening up the telecom industry and mobile network, Ooredoo, Telenor, and MPT, the
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entrepreneurial ecosystem has been leapfrogged to get a better IT infrastructure.
According to this startup guide, international tech startup specialists organized the first
hackathon namely CODE FOR CHANGE, and about 100 developers and designers
worked to create IT solutions. In 2014, there were about 100 tech-startups and about 500
apps for Myanmar language have been developed (Friedl & D’hauwers, 2014).
2.2 Technology Leapfrogging and Catching Up in ICT
According to leapfrog digital strategies, leapfrogging is the concept that areas,
which have poorly developed technology or economies, which can move to the adoption
of a modern system without going through steps by steps (Leapfrog Digital Strategies,
2019). As for technological leapfrogging in the area of telecommunication, Antonelli
(1991) describes that it is a way of IT diffusion to boost growth rate and improve
competitiveness. Additionally, Davison et al. (2000) argue that technology leapfrogging
is to utilize IT for accelerating development and economic growth. As for technology
leapfrogging, the most prominent case can be found in developing countries.
Nowadays, many developing countries caught up with internet technology
completely with developed countries while some developing countries still left behind.
Davison et al. (2000) (as cited in Gray & Sanzogni,2004, p.1) state that technology
leapfrogging shows the case that needs to be considered seriously in the developing world.
Moreover, Weiss (1994) argues that leapfrogging comes with the lower cost of
technologies and user-friendliness in developing countries, which possibly enable them
to develop and implement systems that have not been unavailable before. Thus,
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developing countries have advantages to imitate and adopt new technologies (Lee, 2001),
which offers them to get cost and time-saving benefits and to drive the growth of
technology by learning mistakes from developed countries.
Moreover, developing countries can bypass a particular stage of development
through leapfrogging by adopting advanced technology with benefits such as social,
financial and environmental benefits (Wijkman & Afifi, 2002). It is claimed that “the so-
called New Economy will reinforce the gap between rich and poor nations and increase
income and spatial inequalities within countries” (Baliamoune-Lutz, 2003, p-151). Based
on his findings, Baliamoune-Lutz further suggests that new economy may bring new
channel of economic growth and this channel enables developing countries to catch up
the development faster in a sustainable way (Baliamoune-Lutz, 2003). Again,
Steinmueller (2001) highlights that developing countries have the ability to leapfrog,
mainly in technology production and ICT usage. They can enjoy late comers’ advantages
by using technology diffusion and spillover so that they do not need to invest in
innovating technology. Based on an argument by Davison et al. (2000), developing
countries utilize IT for their business growth and to develop an economic situation in their
countries.
Lander (2000) mentions that there would be eCommerce expansion in South East
Asia as the size of the population is well-educated and young, and the income is rising.
Boyd (2002) suggests that expanding the market and using high tech devices can be
interpreted as a cultural system, and it can develop high tech. Adopting ICT in developing
countries as a technology leapfrogging, they have advantages by following the leader so
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that they can avoid mistakes that are costly and gain the benefits of experiences(Gray &
Sanzogni,2004). The benefit of adopting technology leapfrogging in ICT is that
broadband technology implementation is practicable with a small budget (Saidi & Yared,
2002).
Apart from ICT technology leapfrogging, mobile leapfrogging as a form of
technology leapfrogging is one of the most prominent factors that need to be considered
in developing countries since people from many developing countries can easily own
mobile phones cheaply. Puspitasari and Ishii (2016) define mobile leapfrogging as “the
process of accessing the internet by new internet users by using mobile phones, not PCs”.
Moreover, since mobile phones are more convenient and less expensive than PC, mobile
leapfrogging can enable those who had no access to the internet before, such as less
educated, older, and less affluent people to use the internet (James, 2009). Even in
developed countries like the United States, teenagers from low-income class prefer to use
their phones to go online and pay more for internet access, rather than having a computer
at home (Brown et al.,2011). The result of the studies of Puspitasari and Ishii (2016) in
Indonesia, one of the developing countries, indicates that younger and more educated
people of different economic class use mobile internet especially smartphone. They also
suggest that ICT literacy education is crucial for mobile internet prospects in order to
narrow the digital divide in developing countries.
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2.3 Entrepreneurial Readiness/Self-efficacy
When discussing entrepreneurial readiness, self-efficacy is crucial in overcoming
the obstacles that startups face. Bandura (2010) defines self-efficacy as “the belief of an
individual ability to perform and achieve a specific target”. Wood and Bandura (as cited
in Chen et al., 1998, pg. 296) state self-efficacy as “individual’s capabilities to mobilize
the motivation, cognitive resources, and course of action needed to exercise control over
events in their lives”. If a person has self-efficacy, he or she has more strength to face
obstacles and find ways to perform the path that they have chosen. Connecting this with
the concept of self-efficacy, Drnovsek et al. (as cited in Dessyana & Riyanti, 2017) state
that entrepreneurial self-efficacy is that if a person strongly believes in his or her ability
to run a business, then there is a higher possibility for his or her business to develop.
Dessyana and Riyanti (2017) mention that the determination of entrepreneurial self-
efficacy has six main dimensions: belief in the ability to develop new products and market
opportunities, having the confidence to tackle unexpected challenges, having to utilize
and develop existing resources, trust on core objective and belief of having ability to
create an innovative environment and build relationships with investors. They believe
that the most prominent factor for the success of a digital startup is entrepreneurial self-
efficacy, and if a founder has self-efficacy, then it is easier to develop a startup and sustain
in the long term. Some other authors, Inggarwati and Kaudin (2010), also describe that if
a founder has high self-efficacy, he or she can manage business activities because of
having a stronger desire for his or her business. Similar result is found by Herath and
Mahomood (2014) in their research that founders with a high level of self-efficacy has
better performance of developing new products, can tackle unexpected challenges and
develop human resources.
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2.4 Technology Readiness
Parasuraman (2000) defines technology readiness as "the desire of the customers
to use and adopt new technology to meet the needs, business goals and life every day" (as
cited in Napitupulu et al., 2018, pg. 2). Technological readiness gives the insight to
understand users' behaviors while adopting technology-based products and services
(Napitupulu et al., 2018). Based on Parasuraman's (2000) view, the author urges that
technology readiness is the most crucial factor that affects the adoption process of
technology. The author evaluates technology readiness with four dimensions to
understand the user’s behavior; optimism, innovativeness, discomfort, and insecurity. If
users have a high level of optimism and innovativeness, they can adopt the technology.
The definition of optimism is that users are confident that technology will be useful in
life and improving their productivity in business.
On the other hand, innovativeness is that users have the desire to use the latest
technology, and they have the skills to use it. In contrast, discomfort means that users are
incompetent and face difficulties in adopting technology, and insecurity has a link with
users’ trust in data security while conducting transactions. If users are highly confident
and capable to use technology, it can be said that they have a high level of technology
readiness (Napitupulu et al., 2018). Today, a variety of technology-based products and
services offer benefits or frustration to customers (Son & Han, 2011). The long-term
success of tech startups depends mainly on the increasing usage of new technology and
continuous relationship with customers (Son & Han, 2011). Son and Han (2011) state
that some research on technology acceptance determines individual personality and
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demographics, which affect the level of acceptance. Moreover, technology readiness is
linked to how prepared the public is for new technology (Son & Han, 2011).
2.5 Entrepreneurial Work Experiences and Education
It is crucial for entrepreneurs to have prior work experiences if they want to set
up a business, and they need to have some education on entrepreneurship. In connection
with technology leapfrogging, the entrepreneurs who want to set up their startups get their
ideas from the countries in which they studied, and from the work they did in that country.
According to Evans and Jovanovic (1989), Holtz-Eakin et al., (1994a); Lindh and
Ohlsson (1996), the decision to become an entrepreneur comes from the vital role of
personal characteristics, age, education, working experiences and access to finance. Mata
(1996) also mentions that founders' age as a proxy for education and working experiences.
By following Mata (1996), Colombo. et al. (2004) examine the effects of founders’
human capital on the initial size of new technology-based firms. The authors argue that
if founders have related past work experiences effects, high impact on their startups, and
they explored that previous related work experience and educational attainments
influence crucially on startups’ size and startups’ size is related to the survival of their
business. Both work experiences and education have a positive effect on startups. Adding
on the author's arguments, work experiences, specifically "international work
experiences" and "international education," might impact profoundly on the development
of tech startups in developing countries like Myanmar. Zaheer (2015) argues that the
background of the founder in education, experiences, motivation, and commitment to
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expanding the business with innovativeness, creativity, and personality are internal
factors for the success of tech startups. It is their responsibility to decide their digital
startups whether it will be successful or failure in the market (Dessyana & Riyanti, 2017).
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Chapter III: Research Methodology
Since this is a new research area, there is a limitation for data availability in
entrepreneurship in the least developed countries and theoretical models of leapfrogging
entrepreneurship and technology readiness of the market. In order to shed light on
entrepreneurship and technology readiness of the market in leapfrogging in the least
developed countries, an exploratory qualitative method was followed in this study. The
narrative inquiry method is used to evaluate and analyze the concept of leapfrogged
entrepreneurs, their background and characteristics (international education and work
experiences, entrepreneurial self-efficacy), supports from accelerators and the technology
readiness of the market. The commercial city in Myanmar, Yangon, is chosen to research
as it is a city known to start a tech startup with many resources such as co-working space,
learning environment, accelerators/incubators and accessibility to reach other
stakeholders.
In this study, face-to-face interviews with twenty tech-startup founders, two
accelerators/incubators, and other stakeholders are conducted to understand more about
the characteristics of startups’ founders as leapfrogged entrepreneurs and technology
readiness of the market in the era of technology leapfrogging specifically internet and
mobile leapfrogging. The interviews drilled down to understand their education and work
experiences, their entrepreneurship mindset, the challenges they faced, the story behind
their startups, their strategic view on Myanmar tech-startup environment, and how they
find the problems to solve through their product or service. By interviewing various tech
startup from different areas such as e-commerce, payroll application, education
technology, software business, waste management website, digital marketing service,
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tour application, voucher application, household service application, search engine and
vlog service, variety of aspects and insights of Myanmar tech-startups are gathered in this
study to conceptualize the supply (technology startups) and the demand (the market) by
putting the modifier technology readiness and its elements to balance the supply and
demand to drive innovativeness of the market in the era of technology leapfrogging.
3.1. Data Collection
The researcher started a data collection with collecting startup information from
the internet by checking the Tech in Asia URL for Myanmar startups reputation and
reading reports. After that, checking and investigating social media especially Facebook
or LinkedIn for startups movements and popular startups by observing their Facebook
page, finding founders through Facebook, LinkedIn and connect with them. Furthermore,
reading Phandeeyar (Accelerator) reports about the Myanmar tech startups community
and updating news about Myanmar's current situation, reading news of Myanmar
government to get updated data mainly on the internet.
As Myanmar is poor in statistics, there is no system and accurate data of how
many tech startups registered companies in Myanmar and some registered in Singapore
to get access to funds. Firstly, popular startups companies and types of startups were listed
in the excel sheet and find the founder of those startups. After that, connection with tech
startups founders, both online and offline, was made. Data collection is carried out in
Yangon since Yangon is the central commercial city where startups gather together with
incubators. Based on past connections, tech startups are carefully selected from their
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reputation, and some of them are quite successful in Myanmar. Before conducting
interviews, 30 tech startups were listed on the internet. Due to the difficulties to contact
with all founders, 20 tech startups are chosen, and since it is difficult to get an interview
with founders and C-levels, the study used snow-ball method to connect other startups
through recommendation so that that method enables the research more appealing by
conducting an in-depth interview with founders and C-levels. The face-to-face interview
was conducted during the semester break in August. In February 2020, some interviewees
responded follow-up interview via Facebook Messenger. Before going back to Myanmar,
one of the founders introduced his friends who are founders to get a connection, and it
helped a lot with this research. Moreover, to get in contact with many tech startups
founders, incubators are the most prominent channel to get networks, so visiting
incubators and asking them to recommend interviewing tech startups founders and
connect with them, although it is difficult.
The interview was started with the storytelling of the founders as they were asked
about the background of Myanmar tech startups, their educational background, and work
experiences. The founders answered questions such as "How did you get inspiration to
start this business? What challenges did you face during the startup journey? How did
you deal with customers their inspiration to start tech startups?". Later on, they also
explained their challenges, technology readiness of customers when Myanmar got access
to internet and mobile generation technology with smartphones, and their impression on
the tech-startup environment. According to the interviews with them, eleven founders
studied international education in Myanmar, and nine founders studied overseas. As for
incubators, the manager from Phandeeyar studied overseas, and Seedstar manager is from
a foreign country. The majority of founders who studied overseas studied in Singapore.
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The interviews were recorded using the smartphone and transcribed by the researcher to
review and double-check for accuracy. Some founders were contacted by Facebook
messenger and asked follow-up questions. The interview took at least five minutes to one
hour, based on the interviewees' time availability. The following table shows the
interview date and duration of the interview;
Table 1. List of Companies Interviewed
Interview Interviewe Position Types of

No Duration Brand
date es business
Kyaw Thu Manager Accelerators/
1 02-Aug-18 00:30:48 Phandeeyar
Sein incubators
Manager Accelerators/
2 02-Aug-18 00:13:01 Seedstar Mo
incubators
Potato William Founder Graphic
3 02-Aug-19 00:25:57
Creative Oakar Min design
Founder App for
Nyan
4 02-Aug-19 00:45:05 Zeddite household
Lynn Htet
service
Win Ko Founder
5 03-Aug-19 00:18:47 Project Win Vlog
Ko Aung
6 04-Aug-19 01:27:45 evoucher Htet Will Founder Voucher apps
Wai Phyo Founder Education
7 05-Aug-19 00:23:17 Mmtutors
Aung platform
Peter Founder Education
8 05-Aug-19 00:40:04 Ed Tech
Khant platform
Pearl Co- Education
9 05-Aug-19 00:10:12 Lei Yi Soe
Yadanar founder platform
Co- Information
Ye Wint
10 06-Aug-19 00:36:33 Bindez founder technology
Ko
company
Nyunt win Founder Tour
11 06-Aug-19 00:18:48 GoP
aung platform
Founder Branding and
Htet Arkar
12 07-Aug-19 00:53:36 Bards digital
Kyaw
service
Shwe Founder Waste
13 07-Aug-19 00:36:04 RecyGlo
Yamin Oo management
Flexible Sully Founder Gym
14 08-Aug-19 00:27:32
Pass Bholat platform
15 08-Aug-19 00:14:27 Expa.AI Swan Founder Software
24
Founder Education
16 09-Aug-19 01:14:09 Concept X Soe Htet
platform
Chief
Nikolas
17 09-Aug-19 00:22:02 Shop myar Operation E-commerce
Tun
Officer
Vaughn Co-
18 13-Aug-19 00:08:55 JobDoh Payroll apps
Hew Founder
Nextcode/ Founder
19 15-Aug-19 00:13:49 Booking Thiha Zaw Software
Doctor
Founder Branding and
Ye Myat
20 16-Aug-19 00:08:24 Nextlab Digital
Min
service
Aung Founder Software
21 20-Aug-19 00:11:44 Binary lab
Lwin solution
Wai Phyo Founder Online car
22 21-Aug-19 00:05:52 CarsDB
Kyaw selling
3.2. Data Analysis
The interview transcripts were carefully analyzed by reading over and over and
observing the in-depth meaning of what the interviewees said. Moreover, their posture,
gesture, and expression during interviews were recorded and analyzed in order to get a
real sense of feeling they wanted to express. Firstly, careful reading of each transcript to
find the connections and factors contributing to the interviewee becoming an entrepreneur
during the leapfrogging time helped to interpret the importance of being a leapfrogged
entrepreneur. Secondly, finding main sentences and phrases that trigger the concept of
leapfrogged entrepreneurs and how they benefit leapfrogging entrepreneurship helped to
develop the concept and factors that influence the success of being an entrepreneur in the
least developed countries. Thirdly, finding a similar voice of founders’ frustration and
disappointment with customers’ knowledge of accessing technology to analyze
technology readiness of the market within the context of technology leapfrogging.
25
Fourthly, analyzing words and phrases that express founders’ challenges, characteristics
to become leapfrogged entrepreneurs, and the link between technology leapfrogging and
technology readiness of Myanmar market to understand the better framework of startups
in the technology leapfrogging era and how it leads to the innovative nature of startups.
26
Chapter IV: Background: The Evolution of Mobile Generation
Technology in Myanmar
Myanmar opened up in 2011 from Military government isolation. Before 2011,
the government limited and censored internet usage to access certain websites and
information (Reliefweb, 2013). Reliefweb (2013) report mentions that from 2001 to 2011,
only rich people could buy mobile phones as the cost was more than $5000 and more
expensive than before, and they got access to the 1G or 2G network. In 2011, the mobile
diffusion rate was only 2.38%, and there was only one telecom operator in Myanmar
named MPT, which was under military government control. Myanmar was in the least
developing countries list, and the rate of mobile usage was lower than in other countries
at that time. During the time of the Military government from 1962 to 2011, the
government limited the accessibility of technology and information flow (Reliefweb,
2013). According to world bank cellular subscriptions in Myanmar, there were only 643
subscribers in 1993 (World Bank, 2019; Spectrum.org, 2016) and it can be assumed that
it was the first step that the public got in touch with mobile phones and deployed 1G
network.
In 2003, there were limited telephone lines in rural areas, but telecommunication
facilities were gradually installed in urban areas, and the density (the sum of telephone
subscribers per 1000 people) of the telephone was only 0.7% (Cha, 2017). At that time,
only high-income level people can afford to buy mobile phones with a price of $10000
or more. Since the Myanmar military government has used isolation policy, there was no
data for that time. In 2010, the SIM card was luxury, and they were sold with the lottery
27
system (James, 2019), and there was only one mobile operator, Myanmar Post and
Telecommunication (MPT), under the Military government. At that time, the cost of a
postpaid SIM card was $2,000. In 2012, MPT cut the price of SIM to $250, and MECTel,
Myanmar Economic Corporation, and MPT distributed 350,000 cards in all areas of
Myanmar (Cha, 2017). At that stage, they were able to access the 2G network.
After the government political reform, the civilian government opened up its
internal mobile phone market to international operators to enhance an extensive network
of connectivity (Calderaro, 2014). In order to catch up on mobile technology, Myanmar
needs to rely on external operators since MPT alone cannot provide an extensive network,
and they have limited skills and capabilities. Calderaro (2014) states that more than 90
companies competed to win the tender for telecom operators’ licenses. The government
granted licenses to Telenor, a Norwegian company and Ooredoo, a Qatari company and
they promised to cover 90% of territories by expanding 3G network covering urban as
well as some rural territory. Since the government gave licenses to foreign operators and
joint ventures with KDDI that launched the 4G LTE network, which has high technology
in a mobile generation, Myanmar got a latecomer advantage by deploying foreign
operator technology. All telecom providers started 4G/LTE by using existing 2100
MHz(B1) bands. In 2017, the regulator auctioned more spectrum on 1800 and 2600 MHz
(band 3 and 7) for 4G/LTE (Card, 2017). A new telecom operator entered into the
Myanmar market named Mytel by acquiring the license to operate, and it was the fourth
operator in Myanmar in 2017. Mytel joint venture with Viettel and introduced a 4G
network (Mytel, 2019).
28
Telenor operated its 4G/LTE network on June 15, 2017, after testing the
1800MHz network test in the commercial capital, Yangon, and successfully launched in
other areas (Telenor, Press Release: Telenor Launches 4G/LTE in Yangon, 2017) .
According to Myanmar times news, Ooredoo launched its 4G/LTE network in May 2016.
Ooredoo’s Chief Executive Officer of Myanmar said that Ooredoo introduced the 4G Pro
network, which is three times faster than 4G Plus in January 2018, and he mentioned that
this service would be the fastest in Myanmar. They collaborated with Nokia and ZTE tech
companies in order to upgrade that network, which is a combined Licensed Assisted
Access technology, Carrier Aggregation Access, and 256QAM. It would offer improved
capabilities with unique download speed and network performance (Nyunt, 2018).
Myanmar telecom market was upgraded to the 4G/LTE network within two years
by collaboration with foreign technology. Because of competitive price and quality,
cellular subscription reached over 61 million, which exceed the population of Myanmar,
about 54 million people (YSX, 2018). Although the subscription rate is exceptionally vast,
Myanmar is still at an infant stage to catch up with the latest technology. The government
relaxed subscription policy at that stage and encouraged foreign direct investments.
Because of foreign operators entering into the Myanmar telecommunication
sector, major improvements are found since they invested in telecommunication
infrastructure (YSX, 2018). Starting in 2013, people utilized mobile generation 3G, and
people could get cheap smartphones from China. A significant player was Huawei at that
time, and many smartphone brands appeared and offered only $20. The mobile network
of Myanmar has developed year by year. In 2014, SIM price cost only $1, and there was
29
a high demand for smartphones, and mobile penetration reached all income levels (YSX,
2018).
The mobile penetration rate was dramatically increased in 2013, and it reached to
89.26% in 2016 (YSX, 2018) with the accessibility of 3G to 4G network. Compared to
other Southeast Asian countries, the Myanmar mobile diffusion rate is faster than in other
countries. Since Thailand and Indonesia took over seven or eight years from 10% to 80%
diffusion rate, and Vietnam took four years to get 80%. Oxford Business Group (2019)
describes that the SIM ownership rate reached 105% since people used more than one
SIM card per person in 2018. In spite of starting late, mobile networks in Myanmar
developed much faster than other countries and the 4G download speed now is 28Mb/s
more and 11Mb/s faster than the global average.
Although Myanmar is a developing country, the technology transformation from
1G to 4G is faster than in other countries. Myanmar Communications and Information
Technology Ministry stated in the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, that
Myanmar will soon be ready to implement a 5G network in two or three years (PTD,
2019). 5G network is 20 times faster than the 4G network with a speed of 20 gigabytes
per second (Duffy, 2020). It could help the development of artificial intelligence, virtual
reality, and other technologies. Since Myanmar is a late starter compared to other
developing countries such as Thailand, Indonesia, and Vietnam, it has advantages of
learning from other countries both in technology and policy framework. Because of the
development of mobile generation technology and an increase in the number of mobile
subscribers, telecom operators are trying to improve their service faster since they have
30
the technology. The advantage of Myanmar is that Myanmar is a greenfield market, and
knowledge transfer from high-tech countries benefits its mobile generation
technology. The following chart shows the comparison with Myanmar and other regional
countries and Myanmar gained the highest penetration rate of smartphone and mobile
generation technology (Telenor, 2018).
Figure 1. A Regional Comparison of Smart Phone and 3G+4G Penetration Rate

Source: Telenor (2018). A Regional Comparison (Bar Chart). Retrieved from
https://www.telenor.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Telenor-Realising-Digital-
Myanmar-Report-06-February.pdf
Within three years from 2014 to 2016, technology transfer from foreign firms
enabled enormous advantages to Myanmar. The mobile penetration rate was incredibly
faster in Myanmar than any other country while the government was relaxing the policy
of mobile phone subscriptions. Besides, a smartphone from China came into the
Myanmar market with lower prices and good quality, lower-income level people can buy
smartphones and SIM cards at a lower price. In some cases, one person uses more than
one SIM card, which drives the mobile subscription rate over 100%
(OxfordBusinessGroup, 2019), and diffusion of mobile technology from 3G to 4G is fast,
and even 5G can be deployed within 2 to 3 years. Since mobile network coverage is
increased due to collaboration with international operators, and it allows users easy access
31
to mobile phones and the internet, tech startups appeared to introduce e-commerce and
related service via mobile phone apps.
Because of technology spillover and getting the same mobile technological
infrastructure as developed countries, many tech-entrepreneurs enter into the mobile app
market due to the benefit of mobile technology. As a result of technology transfer, mobile
applications, and tech-entrepreneurs appeared, and they got the benefit of developing
mobile generation technology. The public also gets benefits by getting access to the
internet, and they can learn new technologies through it. However, Myanmar mobile-
generation technology mainly relies on outside support, and Myanmar needs to upgrade
its internal skills and capabilities to innovate and catch-up with new technologies.
Internet infrastructure in Myanmar developed like other countries, and the public
has easy access to all the information within a second. Telecom companies upgraded and
build more infrastructure to double base stations from 8,000 in 2015 to 17,000 in 2017.
Although the telecom sector has changed noticeably, Myanmar still needs to develop
business infrastructure compared to other Southeast Asian countries. A lacking
framework of intellectual property rights becomes a significant barrier for IT companies,
and it is difficult to access funding without collateral due to underdeveloped credit rating
procedures. At the same time, because of the technology change and open market, many
startups appeared to serve services online by exploiting internet infrastructure. Although
affordable workspace and accessing capital are a big issue for startups, many apps-based
startups are emerging in the Myanmar market (Shine, 2018).
32
According to the survey of Phandeeyar, which is a reputable ICT hub in Yangon,
there are 150 startups in Myanmar. Phandeeyar nurtures new startups through a
mentorship program and providing shared office space to the startups who have potentials.
In the last decade, startups business filled a gap in Luxury goods for upper-class users
(automobile and property information) (Nitta, 2018). Currently, Myanmar's smartphone
usage is tremendously increasing because of economic reform and low-price SIM cards
and data plans, and the public skipped from using a computer to mobile phones. Currently,
many startups are trying to fulfill the needs of ordinary customers and doing offline to
online businesses to maximize the utilization of unused assets.
33
Chapter V: Startups in the Mobile Internet Infrastructure in
Myanmar
5.1 Phandeeyar: Is it important that these startups are in an incubator?
The purpose of Phandeeyar is to invest, organize, and find investors for startups
through pitching. Investors are from other countries, so startups founders are needed to
be trained in order to pitch well in front of international investors. In 2015, Phandeeyar
organized three hackathons and one startup competition. A thousand people participated
in these events. In 2016, they launched the first accelerator program. In 2017, they
invested in 7 most promising tech-startups, and they organized more than 251 events.
Moreover, they invested in local tech-startups and trained them to build a tech talent pool.
They also help to improve impact for social tech-startups and run a co-working space in
the downtown area of Yangon (Phandeeyar, 2019).
5.2 Seedstar
Seedstar is a Swiss company, and it operates in more than 80 countries in the
market. Mainly it operates in the Indonesia market. It has five divisions operating as an
incubator; America, Middle East, South Africa, Asia, and Central East Europe. It
organizes competition and mentor, trains new startups by giving them exposure. In 2017,
the government had a desire to open an innovation center, and they call for tender.
Seedstar competed to get tender and win together with a local company called Thura
34
Swiss. Seedstar focuses on broader and bigger innovative technology and creative
companies by providing a startup hub with a creative platform and co-working space.
They mainly focus on tech-startups and capacity building for those startups. In Myanmar,
promising startups are in the market, but they need to reach a level in order to run
sustainably in the market. They provide a platform for startups to collaborate and a
platform that startups can facilitate their selves. Seedstar has two programs, an investment
program, and an academy program. Startups also get benefits from the network that
Seedstar provides by narrowing down their challenges. CB bank is the primary space
partner of Seedstar, and they co-operate together with startups and fintech. In order to
understand the tech startups sector, they work together with the government since the
government understands the context that they do.
5.3 Bindez
Bindez is founded by two Burmese techies, Ye Wint Ko and Htet will in April
2014. They provide a local language search engine for the public to access information
quickly. They won several awards and got the first investment in Myanmar by globally
renowned early-stage VC firm, namely 500 Startups. In 2016, they created an app called
Thadin, which provides news and content discovery platform and commercial partnership
with Ooredoo telecom company, and the founders named were in Forbes Asia's 30 under
30 in the Consumer Technology category (Bindez, 2019). Nevertheless, they realized that
their search engine did not work for many people who cannot use a computer, and they
shared applications by using the software name "Zapya," which is popular in Myanmar.
35
If problems occur, they could not fix by upgrading an application, so they decided to
change the business model by focusing on the B2B business. They provide content
creating service, social media reports for businesses by interpreting information and
customers' comments on social media and estimate customers' behavior and trends. When
they first entered the market, their service was unique and new, and businesses do not
understand the power of data analysis, business intelligence, and market intelligence and
insights they can get from social media. Their company is registered in Singapore and
operates in Myanmar with 30 employees. They have 20 clients-retainers with a one-year
contract, especially banks, telecom, and corporate businesses and offer services to both
local and foreign corporate businesses such as Telenor, Huawei, and Samsung.
5.4 Flexible Pass
Flexible Pass is the first application-based fitness pass in Myanmar in which
customers can access over 80 gyms, fitness centers, and hotels in Yangon, offering a wide
variety of fitness activities. Customers can use over 15 different types of fitness categories
such as gym usage, attending over 100 different types of fitness classes, swimming, rock
climbing, indoor skydiving, yoga, boxing, ice skating, laser tag, paintball, horse riding,
tennis, boot camp, bouldering, special fitness event, futsal and self-defense classes. They
can save up to 40% compared to the daily walk-in rate (FlexiblePass, 2019). Its business
model is appealing and attractive to customers who can buy fitness pass easily via mobile
phone bill, and the prepaid package is valid for six months, and if customers extend their
package, points they purchased from the prepaid package can be carried to the next six
36
months. The flexible pass has over 120 partners with over 1000 users, with 2500 bookings
per month using more than 20 categories. There are 13 employees aged 18 to 25 who are
interested in tech startups.
5.5 GoP
GoP is a tour platform where travelers can find tour packages and local guides,
and their mission is to make travelling easy and get Telenor to accelerate the 2016 award
(GoP, 2019). There are six employees in GoP, and in order to survive its business, the
founder runs other businesses named Venus lab in which they write software and gaming.
The age range of customers are from 25 to 35 years old, and there are over 3000 customers.
Their customer journey is not as easy as they thought; they created an application for
customers unless using applications, customers use Facebook, and they changed their
strategy to create Facebook pages since people are not familiar with applications. But
they received orders from the website since their website is a mobile-friendly one.
5.6 Mmtutor
Founded on May 28, 2017, Mmtutor is the first education technology platform,
which connects private tutors and students by providing the best educational services for
school subjects, professional skills, and languages (Mmtutor, 2019). They provide
students' progress reports to parents by imitating and localizing from one of Singapore's
37
school report systems to access children's education status, and tutors need to report
children's situation. If the student progress not satisfactory, they give consultation
services to parents. There are 13 employees and 200 active customers monthly, but the
total number of customers is 600, and they mainly got customers from Facebook. Their
business model is that they charged a minimum of 10% to a maximum of 13% service
fees to tutors based on their pay and experiences. As for value-added service, they provide
curriculum for language training, but some of them, they customized curriculum and put
teaching materials.
5.7 Zeddite
Zeddite is a tech-startup company founded by Nyan Lin Htet in 2018 as a service
center. They receive the order and transfer it to a serviceman or service center, and they
are responsible for all the after service online. They received an order via Facebook
messenger, phone call. They provide repairing service for fridges, washing machines, air
conditioners by connecting with technicians and customers. They expand their service to
repairing pipelines, installing CCTV, electrical appliances through connecting with the
service center. Firstly, they handled a phone call, but they launched apps in 2019
September, and they are the first platform. They launched an application in 2019 and give
services by optimizing their system by organizing customers’ orders and service centers
efficiently (Zeddite, 2019). Their customers are middle-aged customers who do not know
using an application, and they use only Facebook so as a marketing tool, they participate
in expo to get physical contact with potential customers.
38
5.8 Nexlabs
Nexlabs is an information technology company founded in 2013, and they
combine creativity, innovation, and business insights to build disruptive products that are
ready to take on the future and allow businesses to formulate and execute digital strategies
(Nexlabs, 2019). Their primary customer's focus is on SMEs and large enterprises. As for
the regional market, the company provides services mainly to Singapore, Malaysia, and
Indonesia as international clients and there are approximately 120 to 130 clients.
5.9 Project Win
Project Win PJW is a Vlog founded in 2018 by creating videos with friends and
share creative education videos to late millennials and generation Z. (PJW, 2019). The
founder said that people need practical tips in real life, and his idea is to share his
experiences with youth and how he handled challenges. Youngsters like his video, and
they commented that his videos are authentic. The idea of creating a video blog is that the
product cycle is longer for video than writing blogs and getting social capital from a wide
variety of areas. The founder offers a smart online course, and he felt that it has a positive
impact on society, and the video blog reached 120000 followers, and 76% of followers
are 24 years old. The revenue stream of his business is from online courses, seminars,
offline training, and consultations.
39
5.10 Potato Creative
Potato Creative is founded in 2017, and it is a digital agency by providing design
consultancy and digital services. They provide creative solutions for low to high-end
businesses, both local and international (Potatostrategic, 2019). In 2018, it expended as
Potato strategic holding, two-tech startups, and two non-tech startups. The first one is the
event insiders, a joint venture with one agency ticketing site, and the second one is the
media platform. In 2019, They focused more on digital, social media background API
tools, and they incubate them by forming Potato creative. There are six employees in
Potato creative. The founder said that if the team is big, it is difficult to control them.
They have over 150 clients, both local and international clients from Italy, Netherlands,
and Singapore since he targeted the international market, and mostly his projects are from
foreign countries. The company strategy is different from other agencies since he
cooperates with a competitor agency and accepts outsourcing.
5.11 E-voucher
E-voucher is a tech company that combines voucher printing devices and stock
management technology without the need for a computer. They target businesses, which
want to print a voucher without buying a computer. With the help of devices and
technology, businesses can print vouchers by using a smartphone (E-voucher, 2019). The
company opened two offices in Yangon and Mandalay. There are six employees in
Yangon and two full-time and two part-time employees in Mandalay office. The company
40
sells voucher generating devices at $300, and it launched in the market in December 2016.
Every day, 100 businesses use the device actively since the founder breaks the technology
barrier and enables user-friendly smartphone technology. Most customers are SMEs who
do not want to use a computer. As for customer service, the company offers cash on
delivery and 24/7 call center hotline. The team can train how to operate the device via
phone or if customers need more, they use social media channels by using Viber,
Messenger. The call center is useful and beneficial since the team can train customers
within 45 minutes.
5.12 Pearl Yadanar
Pearl Yadanar is a company that provides software development training and
production management software, and it was started in 2015 (Pearl Yadanar, 2019). The
training period takes three and a half months, and currently, they have 20 people. For
software, there are 20 customers. They also have internship programs for the final year,
and they accept five students per company by providing internship training and give them
real projects. In 2018, there were 63 students and 99 students this year in 2019. They
provide three months internship program once a year. As for advertisement, they use
Facebook and word-of-mouth marketing for training school, but for software, they go
through the network since trust is essential. Training for preparation course and advanced
course fees is 540,000 Kyats(approximately USD380), including the course of IT,
strategy, management, technology, programming, database, web design. As for software,
price depends on user request, and they charge for new features and maintenance.
41
5.13 Ed-tech
Ed-tech is a software company founded in 2013. They provide a software named
e-school for school management systems and applications for parents to monitor their
children's school activities and results with an easy user interface (e-School, 2019). They
cooperated with government universities to provide their services. There are 20000
application users and ten private schools using their system. In the system, parents can
check attendance and their children's educational background. As for the university, their
system is focusing on students to provide information. They changed all paper systems
to a platform system, and they can use the delivery service even for textbook buying.
Course materials are shared through their platform to create a proper system. As for
advertising, they use Facebook and face to face meetings with universities, participates
in events since the target market is small, and penetrating events is beneficial to get
awareness.
5.14 RecyGlo
RecyGlo is founded in 2017 as a waste collection service that won several awards
for its first initiative waste management service. Their mission is to process materials in
a safe, non-hazardous manner by having the aim of keeping the world environmentally
clean. They provide a waste recycling service mostly to B2B, including waste collection,
waste awareness, waste audit, recycle bin supply, and CSR programs. They promote
smart recycling habits by providing recyclables pickup service for organizations in
42
Yangon and delivering them to factories and recycling plants (RecyGlo, 2019). There are
30 employees and 500 customers using recycling service, and they provide all-in-one
service, including data- organizations waste consumption, waste characteristics by
providing reports, awareness Training, and shredding confidential data. They created two
business models; B2B is just dashboard, report, waste conception, and another one is Oh
my trash, C2C model, a platform for buying and selling waste with GPS, price, and
delivery features is for the future forecast. Some waste collectors want to buy significant
volume, and they want to change the habit of waste selling to minimize landfills and give
a positive impact on the environment.
5.15 Expa.ai
Expa.ai is started in 2017, providing chatbot builder service to businesses and
profile engines using machine learning, and Burmese NLU engine to communicate
customers efficiently and effectively (Expa.ai, 2019). They give services for Social media
marketing, Facebook page messaging, and Viber to communicate to the brands by using
an automation tool. They said customers do not want to wait for their complaints, and
they want an instant reply. The main customers are Samsung and Unilever. They want
automated marketing campaigns, such as lucky draw, if a customer wins, the user needs
to fill-up the form through Messenger, and they fill up money to the customers' phone
bills. From the brand point of view, they know users more unlike offline. Brands can
know customer data and personalize marketing tools and promotions to attract them. They
created automation for both customers and the brand side. They have 400 customers, and
43
they created AI to understand Myanmar language, so their business will focus only on
Myanmar.
5.16 Bards
Founded in late 2018, Bards provides digital marketing, tech and development,
branding, and consulting to businesses (Bards, 2019). Dinger is an e-wallet application
that connects with all mobile money payments for customers providing financial
statements and income statements prepared by programing. Bards gives digital marketing
service continuously to 5 to 6 customers, and he has some projects from the U.S and
Egypt since Myanmar labor cost is cheap. They accept projects from the U.S although
the payment is lower than the local market in order to build up their portfolio in the
international market. Bards is only six months old, and there are six to ten employees in
their team. As for advertising, they use only Facebook so that it can reach out to customers
easily.
5.17 Next Code/Book Doctor
Book Doctor is an appointment website for patients to connect with doctors, and
the next code is a cloud-based healthcare record service for doctors and hospitals. They
also provide medical software services to clinics, hospitals, and laboratories (NextCode,
2019). While launching the Book doctor, the company faced difficulties so that they do
44
not focus more since the doctor's arrival time is not accurate and changed to focus more
on patients recording that started in early 2018. The founder said he started the system,
and problems that he faced is that standardized electronic medical records since it depends
on each doctor's needs. Twenty clinics are using their service.
5.18 JobDoh
JobDoh was founded in 2017 in Myanmar as a subsidiary company owned by
foreigners. Their parent company is in Hong Kong. They provide human resource service
and employee payroll system to the companies (JobDoh, 2019). The company is based in
Hongkong, and they focus mainly on HR. Three years ago, the founders noticed that
there are opportunities in Myanmar, and they changed HR to fintech. They introduced
payroll services by cold calling one company, and 100 employees are using this service
as a pilot stage.
5.19 Concept X
Concept X is an online learning platform founded in 2018. They provide online
learning videos for grade 11 and 12 courses to improve the education system of Myanmar.
They also offer offline training to teachers to improve professionalism (ConceptX, 2019).
The company focuses on students, but interestingly 70% of their customers are teachers,
and there are 200 customers currently. They sell a one-year subscription application at
45
only $10. However, they changed their business model and increased the price to $30.
There are 15 employees in Concept X, and some are part-timers.
5.20 Shopmyar
Shopmyar is an e-commerce platform founded in 2014 as a one-stop online
shopping website selling a variety of products. They provide a flexible payment system
with the fastest delivery service having seven days return policy. They have their own in-
house logistics team and third-party logistics partners. (Shopmyar, 2019). They imported
tailored-made products by manufacturing and holding inventories, including electronics,
travel, living, household product, and furniture. They have an application for both IOS
and Android users. However, the company said they would rebrand Shopmyar since it is
not successful as expected, and there are 80 employees in their team. Mainly, they
imported products from China as they do not have any brand yet, so that they focused on
quality. They do campaign to educate customers. As for innovation, they brought
bladeless technology for a child-friendly feature. The company creates a happy
environment for employees in order to get rid of traditional blaming culture and build a
learning culture.
46
5.21 Binary Lab
Binary Lab is a software development company, and they give services for
developing mobile apps and web design (Binarylab, 2019).They accept outsourcing,
creating mobile applications, software, and various technology services as an outsourcing
company. There are 20 employees in the company who are giving services to both local
and international clients. The revenue stream is 50% from local and 50% from
international clients, with a total number of 17 clients. The international clients are from
Hong Kong and getting ongoing projects. The founder said the company is creating an
application for education, and if there is good feedback, they will find funding from
investors.
5. 22 CarsDB
CarsDB is a well-known e-commerce platform for selling and buying new and
used cars, accessories, and parts in Myanmar. They started on January 4, 2012, and they
have been over seven years in the market, and they are one of the earliest and leading
tech-startups in Myanmar (CarsDB, 2019). Today, there are 0.3 million users and 10
million transactions on their website and application. There are 70 employees in the
business. Through that platform, both sellers and users can trade used, and brand-new
cars, car parts, and accessories, and the company also organizes auto shows and
exhibitions offline.
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Chapter VI: Discussion
When conducting several interviews with tech-startups founders, C-levels, and
incubators from different business nature, e-commerce, software development, Fintech,
education, and different service sectors, the findings show insights of tech startups. The
study suggests that there are four significant challenges that most startups are facing. The
first challenge is the human resource problem. One founder said, “brain drain is a big
challenge! It is difficult to retain employees!”. The findings indicate that most founders
face the problem of acquiring talents for their startups due to a limited pool of talent in
the labor market. Employee retention is another challenge for the founders. Although they
could find talents they need and employed them, employees quitted their job after the
founders had trained them. Then, they moved to big corporations due to high pay and
facilities offered by big corporations.
The second one is access to funding, which is related to both government rules
and regulations and founders' passion and experiences to operate a business. The analysis
shows that local investors are not interested in investing in tech startups. Most founders
get funding from foreign countries only if they register the company in Singapore. The
study expresses that it is difficult to get funding for startups who registered in Myanmar.
However, one founder said, “my strategy is participating in the international startup
competitions to get funding and connection” so that some startups can get funding
through this strategy if their service is promising.
The third one is government support in the area of the tech startup infrastructure.
Since the infrastructure is still weak in Myanmar, there are many areas to improve startups’
48
environment. According to the interviews, most founders found government rules and
regulations for tech startups to be weak, and not having a proper policy to protect their
business. Another factor found in the study that when the internet was booming, Myanmar
leapfrogged from using a computer to a smartphone so that many people are not familiar
with computers. Since computers are not a necessity in their daily life or for their
education, Myanmar does not have an e-learning culture in the past. So, most people do
not know how to use a computer as they are familiar with paper works only.
In contrast, everybody wants a smartphone for communication purposes. If tech
startups understand customers’ behavior on tech usage, they can create a product that is
fit for customers. As most of the founders mentioned, Myanmar people use Facebook as
a search engine rather than Google, and Facebook advertising still influences in the
market. To step ahead to the leapfrog payment system, e-commerce, using application
and education, play an essential role for the public to learn how to use the payment system
online, e-commerce, and applications to buy the services offered by startups. The
following figure shows the clear identification of challenges that startups faced when
entering a tech startup business:
Figure 2. Challenges of Startups in Myanmar

Source: Author
49
6.1 The Emergence of Leapfrog Entrepreneurs
Although Myanmar is still limited in total infrastructure such as communication,
supply chain, transportation, distribution network, financial institutions, capital market,
energy supply, it has leapfrogged to internet and mobile generation technology. People
get access to smartphones and the internet, which become an enormous opportunity for
startup founders to enter into the digital economy of Myanmar since the setup cost is
cheap in Myanmar. The findings express that several factors including incomplete
infrastructure, limited rules and regulations of intellectual property, limited policy for
implementing digital economy, weak taxation system, limited human resources, and
difficulty to access funding prevents startups to run their business successfully and create
challenges for entering into the international market although some startups have
capabilities to do so.
The study indicates that some tech startups do not have the plan to go to the
regional market as they give services by using an existing model and localize it to adjust
with the public needs. However, some startups giving technical services like software
solutions, branding, and digital services go to the international market. They get clients
from foreign countries since Myanmar labor cost is cheap, and they can give good quality
services like other foreign countries. Some startups giving solutions to impact problems
have to plan to go to the regional market if their idea is new to other countries. While
analyzing their educational background, some of them studied in foreign countries, and
most of them received international diplomas in Myanmar.
However, because of the accessibility of internet and language ability to learn
international education, the study has found out that some founders learn only in
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Myanmar, and they got a creative idea due to the spillover effect of the internet. When
analyzing the interviews, the study revealed that entrepreneurial self-efficacy encourages
the willingness to learn online. However, they did not have a chance to study foreign
countries, and it clearly shows a strong link between entrepreneurial self-efficacy and the
education of founders. The exciting thing is that although some founders have the plan to
study abroad, they canceled this opportunity and set up tech startups in Myanmar, On the
other side, they learn online courses. Even though technology readiness for the market is
low, founders started their business by adjusting the requirements of market needs and
improving their technology and services by establishing a brand.
Having difficulties in the Myanmar market, it has highlighted that leapfrogged
entrepreneur does appear although technology readiness for the Myanmar market is still
lagging during the time of technology leapfrogging. According to researcher’s
interpretation, a leapfrogged entrepreneur is someone who has experience with cutting
edge technology and go back to his or her home country (the least developed country) or
who grew up in the home country but having a burning desire to learn other countries via
online and utilize his or her knowledge and available infrastructure to introduce the latest-
generation technology product or service. The findings of the interviews affirm that
Myanmar startup founders left the developed countries and went back to their home
country without staying in developed countries, even though they have the opportunity to
stay there. In addition, some founders started business in Singapore when they see market
opportunities in Myanmar.
“If I start a business in Singapore without money. Nobody will give me a place to
live and food. Three months of living costs, approximately 3000 SGD. This
51
amount of money is a good start for business in Myanmar. The small space of
apartment 800sqft is 80,000 kyats per month or 480,000 kyats for six months of
rental at the time of 2010-2011. So, I decided to go back to Myanmar” (e-School
founder, Peter Khant).
The study’s concrete factor is that the Myanmar market is developing, and they
found business opportunity in their home country. Some of them have family members
in Myanmar so that they want to settle down in the home country. Some of them want to
utilize their skills, abilities, and knowledge they gained from developed countries to home
countries to give services to promote the country's economy. The study has shown that
leapfrogged entrepreneurs emerged during the time of technology leapfrogging, and
several potential entrepreneurs were willing to enter the tech startup community. This
study helps potential startups to understand the startups' environment in Myanmar and
problems that current startups are facing so that potential leapfrogged entrepreneurs can
learn how to develop their services sustainably.
6.2 Entrepreneurial Work Experiences and Education
Based on the interviews with twenty tech-startup founders, eleven of them studied
in Myanmar, and ten of them studied in the U.K, the United States, Australia, Singapore,
and India. These findings explain that studying in home country or abroad does not make
much different for founders to start tech-startups. All of them have a background in the
international education. None of them have only a degree from Myanmar public
University. Even though some founders studied in Myanmar, the subject they studied is
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mostly IT and business management, which is accredited by U.K and U.S.A. So, they got
access to international education within the country.
The finding shows that funders who studied abroad have more ability to retain,
grow their business, and more opportunity to access international networks to get funding
compared to founders who studied in Myanmar. However, because of the internet, the
founders who want to study globally have more chances to explore new knowledge,
especially online, and they can see what the market gap is and enter into the startup’s
community. Interestingly, some founders within the interview said they did not study
abroad, and they leverage the cost of studying abroad and the success of starting their
startup within Myanmar since they can see an excellent opportunity in the market:
“I did not graduate in Singapore; I took the opportunity to go back to Myanmar
and left the University” (Nexlab founder, Ye Myat Min).
It has highlighted that opportunities in Myanmar outweight studying in Singapore,
and he successfully runs his business. With the increasing rate of smartphone penetration
and telecom infrastructure development in Myanmar, it attracted talented emigrants to
come back home. Consequently, they set up tech startups by utilizing their knowledge
and skills from developed countries by imitating their business models, which work well
and localize them to fit the needs of customers. As for some startups, they use
groundbreaking technology by identifying home market needs and develop business
overseas:
“When I came back to Myanmar, I had a desire to start my own business. I was
looking for opportunities, and I found out that the tech startup industry was
53
booming in 2016 and saw an opportunity in the fitness industry, and I competed
in Phandeeyar startup competition” (Flexible pass founder, Sully Bholat).
It emphasized that he applied the knowledge he gained from overseas to apply in
the Myanmar market by localizing the market needs. He targeted expatriates and
millennials to give services by booking gyms through his application. Users already know
how to use applications since his target is a developed market, and he modifies his model
by connecting with phone payment, which is easy for users. Although the idea was not
new and already used in other countries, he adopted and localized it based on the market
needs and become successful. So, it is essential to adjust the acquired technology with
local needs to run the business successfully. Since the whole market is not digital literate,
the choice of market segment and utilization of existing infrastructure, such as mobile
banking or phone payment, contribute to the success of tech startups as it gives users a
sense of ease of use for them.
According to the interview, some founders have both the international education
and work experiences in a foreign country, especially in Singapore. The findings have
shown that founders are eager to leverage their education and work experiences by setting
up their business in Myanmar when the Myanmar market opened up in 2011:
“I saw the opportunity and changes in Myanmar, so I decided to set up business
in Myanmar rather than working in Singapore” (CarsDB founder, Wai Phyo
Kyaw).
Some founders did not have any work experiences even locally, and they said they
faced many difficulties to start a business. Some founders have local work experiences,
54
and their prior experiences drive them to enter into the tech startup community since they
have domain expertise, and their experiences help them accelerate their startup growth.
Most startups founders are techies who are already familiar with technology, which is one
of the factors that drive them into a tech startup business.
“For tech-startups, they need to have a passion and accept challenges. I believe
experiences are important” (E-voucher founder, Htet Will).
Some founders failed in their first business, and they learned mistakes from
previous business failures and apply them in new startups. So, they understand more
about the situation and how to handle and survive in the long term. The analysis indicates
that previous work experiences of founders play a crucial role to become leapfrogged
entrepreneurs to introduce new product or services in the market that is driven by internet
and mobile technology.
6.3 Entrepreneurial Self-efficacy
When interviewing all the startups’ founders, the study has found out that all
startups founders have entrepreneurial self-efficacy to run their business. Entrepreneurial
self-efficacy is the most crucial factor in sustaining and running the business in a
leapfrogged environment in terms of technology. Mostly, people use smartphones, but
they do not have proper education for that technology, and the market has the untapped
opportunity, but it still needs time to develop. All the tech-startups founders saw
technology and market opportunities in the market and have strong passion and
55
knowledge, and they entered into tech startups rather than working in a big corporation
or living in developed countries.
The findings have shown that founders’ entrepreneurial self-efficacy introduces
new technology into the new market by leveraging leapfrogging technology opportunities.
According to some interviewees, when an entrepreneur sees a technological opportunity
to offer new services in the market and the market itself is new to penetrate, he or she
trade-off his or her plan to study abroad, resign from corporate work, and starts his or her
startup by offering innovative services. Binary Labs founder said,
“I saw an opportunity, and I accept outsourcing, creating mobile applications,
software, and various technology needs for my survival and to develop new
products that I am passionate about by using revenue from Binary Labs.”
It has highlighted that if founders have a passion or a strong desire, they generate
new ideas and grab all the opportunities to create new products and try to survive in the
market. Some founders did not get their desired job, and they changed their careers by
entering into the technology industry in which their prior skills matched. One founder
said,
“I did not get the job that I applied as a software developer. So, I applied for a
lecturer and met with my teacher, who became a business partner” (Pearl
Yadanar).
In this case, she found her path that she wanted to be an entrepreneur, and her
spirit of entrepreneurship popped up in this business. One founder commented that,
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“Some founders think a startup is just a side business, and they do not care much
about the success rate. Later the company dies! Founders' commitment is
important.”
According to that comment, entrepreneurship in the era of leapfrogging
technology is not that simple, and they need a burning desire and action to pass over the
Death Valley of startups. Although being a startup in Myanmar is easy because of the low
cost of setting up a startup, it is critical to keep the business alive for a long time. Without
entrepreneurial self-efficacy, startups founder in the least developed country cannot be
defined as leapfrogged entrepreneurs. The following figure shows the characteristics of
startup founders setting up their business:
Figure 3. The Visualization of Founders’ Background Knowledge, Self-efficacy and

Emergence of Startups at the Time of Technology Leapfrogging
Source: Author
57
6.4 The Importance of Accelerators/Incubators
Most of the founders started their startup through incubators, and some of them
started on their own. The analysis in the study revealed that there are five main reasons
that startups joined accelerators. The first reason is that they get benefits of publicity when
they compete for startups idea competition under accelerator programs. The second
reason is that they get training from accelerators if they do not have any experience and
get support from idea consultations. Thirdly, it is easier to access funding and investments
from foreign countries through accelerators such as Phandeeyar and Seedstar. The fourth
reason is that they get opportunities to learn in foreign countries, join startup mentoring
programs, submit and forum through the connection from accelerators, get more
international exposure, and able to learn new idea generation and problems from other
startups. The fifth reason they joined the accelerator program is that they can cooperate
with other startups and learn from each other to solve problems or to find founding team
members who are crucial for tech startups.
“I rented a co-working space at Phandeeyar because it gives opportunities for
employees to see what other people are doing, availability of resources and
networking is good in Phandeeyar so that I can get connections and advises”
(RecyGlo founder, Shwe Ya Min Oo).
The research has found that almost every founder joined accelerator programs as
their first step to introduce their products and services and get support from them. The
above statement confirmed that accelerators are vital to get opportunities for startups with
proper co-working space, mentorship, and networking opportunities with international
investors. However, it has found out that some startups do not join accelerators if they
already have networks and funding through their connections. Interestingly, founders
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who do not join accelerators study online courses from the U.S or other countries by
utilizing the internet. One founder argued that accelerators are not that helpful for him.
“Some tech startups founders do not have a strong education level about
technology and accelerators educate them about tech startups. The reality is that
accelerators do not understand real-life problems for founders as they do not have
practical experiences, although they have a theoretical background. So, I prefer
to learn from online classes like Y combinator startup school as it is excellent that
funders are successors, and their problems are the same as other startups. So, I
can accept what they said.”
Although there are some counter arguments of the importance of accelerators,
generally many startups joined accelerators as their first step by participating in startups
competition to introduce their business idea.
“I found out Seedstar accelerator and I participated in the competition of 65
countries. Later I was invited to Switzerland in 2016. At there, investors from the
whole world, including CEO and COO, mentored me. Starting from this point, I
entered into a startup business”(Ed tech founder).
Moreover, startups joined accelerators for finding investments. One founder said,
“I started my company through the Phandeeyar program, but I changed to
Seedstars later since they have a more attractive investment program as I can find
foreign investments.”
The findings imply that most startups started their business by using accelerator
channel since they do not need much investment for accommodation by joining
accelerator program and get resources from them. Phandeeyar or Seedstar is attractive to
many potential tech startups founders and current startups since they give several benefits
59
to startups. On the other hand, they also help Myanma’s digitalization sector to develop
the economy and encourage innovation and solve problems within the Myanmar market.
Moreover, the study shows that startup like RecyGlo joined Phandeeyar accelerator as
their first step and now they even reached out to the regional market since the idea is new
in South East Asia, and they even opened an office in Indonesia. With support from
accelerators and their unique idea, some startups go to the international market. Myanmar
startups can also penetrate and compete at the international level if they have new ideas,
technical expertise, and a strong founding team. The incubators are essential due to the
reasons mentioned above, and the figure 3 below shows the types of support that tech
startups get from accelerators:
Figure 4. Types of Support from Accelerators to Technology Startups

Source: Author
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6.5 Technology Readiness of Market
Since Myanmar liberalized its ICT sector in 2014, many people began using
mobile phones and mobile internet. At the same time, Facebook started to become popular,
and many people use Facebook as a search interface to find a wide variety of information
and entertainment. While analyzing the technology readiness of Myanmar, there are two
broad customer groups: businesses and individuals. Some startups focus on business to
business (B2B) model, and others focus on the business to customer (B2C) model and
customer to customer (C2C) model, based on their preferences and market conditions.
With the relatively recent introduction of mobile technology, however, most small
businesses do not know how to utilize data from social media to develop their business
performance level:
“The challenges my company faced is that market is still in the early stage, and
most businesses do not understand what they can do with business intelligence,
market intelligence, insights, and data analysis. Family businesses do not
understand these tools, and they just decide on their opinion. Most of them do not
know how to start the process, and they do not have a standard operating
procedure, and they do not have any knowledge to use data on social media. So,
when they first entered into that market. So, when I first entered that market, the
market was not ready at that time, and it was a big challenge for me since our
service is unique and new” (Bindez founder, Ye Wint Ko).
The interpretation of the interview’s statement shows that although they have
access to technology, they do not have the knowledge to utilize them. Family businesses
have incompetent knowledge to apply technology to interpret their business and exploit
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them to know their customer’s behavior and business forecast. Although technology
leapfrogged fast, users still need to improve their mobile literature to utilize leapfrogged
technology fully. Another factor is that individual customers do not know to use the
benefit of digitalization and mobile technology. Although they have smartphones, people
do not know how to install and update apps. They go to a mobile shop to put apps and
share apps by using an app called “Zapya,” and the mobile shop puts that app in their
smartphone to transfer files and to install other apps. The most popular application for
every person is Facebook, and they consider Facebook as their primary information
source. It shows that the market is still a follower market, and people need a
recommendation from mobile shops. As Myanmar is a collective society, people also ask
recommendations from their friends. So, it is difficult to launch and update the application
if founders create an application and fix errors when found out since most people have a
lack of knowledge to install or update an application:
“Customer journey is not that simple. I’m a techie, so my team emphasized
developing an application since we are developers. But I found out that it is not
that useful since many people use Facebook, and they are not familiar with
applications. Another one is payment problem, but now I am using mobile banking,
which is quite convenient” (GOP founder, Nyunt Win Aung).
As the founder has mentioned, it is clear that customer education level is also vital
as it influences customers' behavior and how they use applications. As people in
Myanmar use Facebook as their primary information source, but they do not how to use
Google to check websites or download other applications on a smartphone. Lacking
digital literacy and language barrier since most applications are in English, people depend
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mainly on mobile shops to install applications, and they take suggestions from a mobile
shop for which applications they need to install. Customers do not know the usefulness
of google play store or apple store. Most of them rooted their phone to get the application
without barriers. The most challenging thing is that most people in their 40s, 50s do not
know how to create a Gmail account or Facebook account. Because of limited knowledge
of customers, many startups faced with difficulties if they targeted the general public.
They can use only Facebook pages for online marketing and phone calls to get interaction
with customers, and they cannot leapfrog to application or payment system since it is
difficult for users to adopt these technologies:
“I cannot leapfrog to the payment system. If all the users can easily use a
smartphone rather than depending on Facebook, I can leap a payment system on
e-commerce. Generally, everybody needs to have knowledge of prosperity and
payment system for synchronizing with other devices and knowledge”(Zeddite
founder, Nyan Lin Htet).
Although internet and mobile generation technology has leapfrogged in Myanmar,
education and digital literacy of the public are essential to drive the economy smoothly
and to catch up with digitalization fully. By interpreting the interviews, it might take
several years to improve the digital literacy rate of the general public in Myanmar, and
most of them do not apply to the technology readiness level. Hence, startup founders need
to adjust their strategies to suit the public needs to be sustainable in the market by
localizing applications with the Myanmar language feature. Since the Myanmar market
does not support the environment for technology readiness, there are many difficulties
that the startup founders faced. The research found out that it is easy to set up a business
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in Myanmar if the founder has an idea. It costs approximately $200 to get company
registration. Although technology is leapfrogged at the same level as other countries and
founders have technology and idea to give services with the presence of basic
infrastructure, the technology readiness of the market is still limited, and the market is
not ready to utilize these innovations. CarsDB founder said;
“I got an idea to create a platform to trade online rather than offline, and I faced
difficulties and challenges since customers do not understand how to use the
internet.”
This shows that limited knowledge of customers leads to difficulties for startups.
Customers are not familiar with using websites, although they have no language gap since
Myanmar startup founders create their website with Myanmar Language. The study has
found out that most customers concentrate on simple applications and easy user interface,
but because of the lacking knowledge of downloading and updating applications, they
end up with traditional phone calls and Facebook messages. The interpretation of the
study is that people use the simple application, especially Facebook and ignore to use
other applications and websites. The study revealed that entrepreneurs (startups founders)
are smarter than the market and they applied their knowledge gained from developed
countries, and they offer services using technology, but they faced with challenges due to
the incapability of the market since customers do not get the time to get used to the
technology and they do not use it broadly. The market itself is very narrow for founders
to innovate more. Most startups create applications, but they went back to the traditional
method of calling phone. It has further revealed that people have smartphones, but they
use it only for simple functions such as calling, messaging and using Facebook. So, the
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market is minimal on specific applications (Facebook), and they are not ready to use other
applications so that founders have a limitation on innovation.
The following figure shows the elements needed for technology readiness to be a
smart market;
Figure 5. The Causes of Low Level of Technology Readiness of the Market, which is a
Key Challenge Facing Startups in Myanmar
Source: Author
6.6 Proposed Conceptual Framework
The narrative analysis of the study emphasized the characteristics of leapfrogged
entrepreneurs, and the result has shown that there is inequality between startups founders’
knowledge of technology and technology readiness of the market. However, no matter
how brilliant the entrepreneurs are, it would be nothing if the market is not ready. By
assuming leapfrogged entrepreneurs on the supply side, it is crucial to focus on analyzing
technology readiness for the demand side to get a comprehensive view of the situation in
Myanmar. The above discussions have shown that the demand side has a limited market
due to the low level of technology readiness, so startups have a limited boundary between
innovation and a narrow market although they have skills such as entrepreneurial self-
65
efficacy, international education and work experiences and support as accelerators. The
study has shown that startup founders have the characteristics of leapfrogged
entrepreneurs. They have done much in contributing to trigger the demand in the market
by localizing their technology and building easy user interface or educating customers in
order to shift to the next level from technology leapfrogging to market leapfrogging
(traditional purchasing system to online purchasing system by deploying the whole
buying process online). However, they cannot do it alone; both government and the public
need to collaborate to upgrade this process. The proposed hypothesizes are that: H1:
Technology readiness of the market moderates the positive effect of tech readiness of
entrepreneurs (supply) on startups success (demand). H2: Imitative character of startup
(supply) has a positive effect on startup success (demand). The following framework has
been suggested based on the study to show the link between technology leapfrogging and
the nature of follower market. Technology readiness of the market is moderating variable
to drive innovative or imitative/localized nature of tech startups.
Figure 6. The Visualization of Supply and Demand Effect with the Modifier Technology
Readiness of the Market
Source: Author
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Chapter VII: Conclusion
7.1 Conclusion and Recommendations
In conclusion, the problems of human capital, government, and infrastructure is
related to the status of a follower country. Because of a follower country, it does not have
a tremendous human capital, and a government who understands the importance of digital
policy and excellent infrastructure such as payment system. According to Telenor (2018),
78% of internet users have poor digital literacy, although the sim penetration rate is 105%,
and the smartphone penetration rate is 80%. The sim penetration and smartphone
penetration rate are an illusion for startups opportunities. So, technology leapfrogging has
specific effects that give minimal advantages for startups. However, some startups are
successful by combining technology and traditional lifestyles, such as the gym platform
mentioned in the discussions. The consequence of technology leapfrogging is that
everything is affordable in the beginning, and startups do not need to compete with a
thousand companies.
Initially, it is suitable for startups founders to go back to Myanmar, but the
problem is that the country’s market is not ready for innovation. When they do follower
innovation, then it is better to enter into the market. However, innovation is new, and it
does not work since it is not the market that picks innovation first. They need some time
to adopt the technology, and it shows that leapfrogging is not a sign for innovativeness as
the consequence of being a latecomer. Startups introduce new technology, which is easy
to use for minimal applications, and technology leapfrogging does not create innovation
opportunities. However, it creates follower opportunities or narrow innovation
opportunities. The main conclusion is that technology leapfrogging does not create an
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excellent opportunity, and it is not the right startup environment for innovation. However,
it is suitable for follower innovation and localization of services by upgrading the
traditional way from offline to online.
The technology infrastructure is there, and mobile penetration is high, but it does
not mean the penetration enables startups to use that infrastructure for innovative ideas.
Furthermore, people use Facebook mainly and no other apps because the market has
follower behavior. They are not making a decision based on their own needs, and they
are asking for recommendations as to the nature of the follower market and collective
society. They react to the recommendation, and it is suitable only for the applications that
are successful in other countries, and that is not how the market works. Innovativeness of
the market means people are making a decision based on the assessment of their own
needs.
The basic characterization of the least developed country market is that it is a
follower market, and it is a situation where new infrastructure is there, but it does not
completely support startups for innovation, and they still need to wait for other countries
to decide what design is the winner for the market. However, the study found that some
startups are successful as they captured the narrow opportunity of the market by localizing
their services and choosing the right market segment.
The recommendation is that a startup should not try to do something new and try
to do something that is already successful in other countries as an imitation strategy and
localize it in order to be adaptable in the market. Furthermore, if they innovate new
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services that have potential then it is better to go to regional market by collaborating with
foreign startups founders. Moreover, if startups choose a localization strategy by
combining with existing infrastructure by targeting digitally literate market segments
such as expatriates, millennials, and Gen Z, it would create an excellent market
opportunity for startups. However, technology leapfrogging still does not work much for
the mass market based on this study. The new infrastructure does not make an innovative
country. They need the recommendation, and they need to see what innovative business
model is leading in the world. Using Facebook and mobile network exclusively does not
lead to an innovative environment.
To conclude, the market is not innovative as it is still a follower market. It looks
attractive for startups, but it is not as attractive as they think that sometimes happens in
the least developed country. They would have been better if they stayed in developed
countries to speed up their innovative potential. However, technology leapfrogging can
create a good environment for startups if the market is ready for technology. In order to
drive the digital economy and startups sustainability of the least developed country,
Myanmar, the study has highlighted the importance of supply and demand in the context
of startups in the technology leapfrogging and the technology readiness of the market.
From the supply side, the study describes the main elements of startups' characteristics
and the support factors such as incubators. As for the demand side, the study indicates the
crucial elements of technology readiness of the market to utilize the services that tech-
startups offer and suggest a conceptual model. Additionally, the researcher urges the role
of government to make a comprehensive policy for startups and educate digital literacy
69
to the public starting from elementary school to transform the digital economy and utilize
the advantage of technology leapfrogging to develop the country's economy.
7.2 Limitations and Further Research
This study is focused only on supply (tech-startups), demand (innovative or
imitative/localized nature of the market) and technology readiness of the market in the
least developed country, Myanmar. Because of limited data availability, sources of
information, and time constraints, this study is generalized twenty tech startups, who run
their business successfully and two well-known accelerators by using qualitative
approaches. However, there are over one hundred and fifty startups in Myanmar.
This research is developing a conceptual framework of tech startups'
characteristics and the element of technology readiness of the market to link the
innovative or imitative/localized nature of the market. This study mainly explores
leapfrogged entrepreneurs and their narrow boundaries of innovation as the market is not
ready since the interviews highlighted the characteristics of leapfrogged entrepreneurs,
the challenges that they face during their initial stage of startups, their struggles during
the leapfrogging period, and the changes of the business model to survive that fit
customers' needs as a follower market.
As the area of this study is new to the Myanmar market, there are many areas to
research technology startups. Further researches should be done by analyzing various tech
startups from different perspectives. Leapfrogging requires government policy
70
implications and payment systems to drive the growth of tech startups. Due to the
technology spillover of the internet, leapfrogged entrepreneurs do not need to go to
foreign countries and learn about international education within Myanmar. They can be
successful in their business if they have strong entrepreneurial self-efficacy. Further
research can find the relationship between prior experiences and the success of leapfrog
entrepreneurs, the relationship between online learning and the success of leapfrog
entrepreneurs who live only in the home country, and who do not have international work
experiences and international education and tech startup eco-system in the least
developed countries. Moreover, the researcher suggests that future researchers develop a
framework to analyze technology readiness in relation to technology leapfrogging.
71
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Appendices
1. List of Startups
No Name Founder/ Type of International International work

Co-Founder business education experiences
1 CarsDB Wai Phyo online car Singapore Singapore

Kyaw selling
2 Binary lab Aung Lwin software India No

solution
3 Nextlab Ye Myat Branding Singapore No
Min and Digital
service
4 Nextcode Thiha Zaw software Myanmar No
Booking
Doctor
5 JobDoh Vaughn Payroll apps Australia yes
Hew
6 Concept X Soe Htet Education U. S No
platform
7 Shop myar Nikolas Tun ecommerce U. S No
8 Flexible Sully Bolat Gym U. S No

Pass platform
9 Expa.AI Swan software Myanmar No
10 Bards Htet Arkar Branding Myanmar No

Kyaw and Digital
service
11 RecyGlo Shwe waste Myanmar No
Yamin Oo managemen
t
12 Bindez Ye Wint Ko Information Myanmar Singapore
technology
company
13 GoP Nyunt win Tour Myanmar No
aung platform
14 Mmtutors Wai Phyo Education Myanmar No

Aung platform
15 Ed Tech Peter Khant Education Myanmar/Sw Singapore

platform itzerland
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16 Pearl Lei Yi Soe

Education Myanmar No
Yadanar platform
17 evoucher Htet Will voucher Myanmar No
apps
18 Project Win Ko Ko Vlog Myanmar No
Win Aung
19 Potato William graphic Singapore Singapore
Creative Oakar Min design
20 Zeddite Nyan Lynn app for Myanmar No
Htet household
service
21 Phandeeya Kyaw Thu Accelerator
r Sein
22 Seedstar Mo Accelerator
2. Interview questions
2.1 How did you start this business?

2.2 Why did you choose technology startup rather than traditional business?
2.3 What inspire you to enter tech-startups?
2.4 What is your education background?
2.5 Did you study abroad?
2.6 Where did you work before?
2.7 What are your challenges being as a tech-startups?
2.8 Do people understand what you offer? Could you please explain?
2.9 What is your opinion about tech-startups environment?
2.10 Could you please explain your startup journey?
2.11 Why did you join accelerators?
2.12 Did you get any seed capital or funding? or is it your own investment?
2.13 Do you have plan to penetrate into other regional market?
2.14 Who do you benchmark?
2.15 Would you like to add any additional information?
3. Interview scripts: transcription
3.1 Phandeeyear
When interviewing with the entrepreneur manager of Phandeeyar, Mr. Kyaw Thu
Sein, he said that he studied in the UK. He worked at the Ppt simulation tool and
interactive games company, and he was a software programmer since his master's degree
in programming. The overview journey of Myanmar tech-startups that he explained is
that there are a few internet users in 2012. However, when telecom companies entered
77
into Myanmar market in 2013, users' rates increased to 13%. Additionally, the user rate
reached 50% within one year. At that time, two or three Tech startups entered the market,
and they got the first-mover advantage and got market opportunities.
In 2012, Amazon and freelancer.com became dinosaurs in the world. In 2013,

there was still no market in Myanmar. However, after 2014, tech startups emerged and
imitated ideas from other countries. At that time, an online store like shop.com emerged,
and there was no competitor at that time, and there are areas that need to be solved in
Myanmar like waste problems. Phandeeyar runs a program called Startup challenge
competition once a year. In July 2019, 330 people joined this program and formed 80
groups. Among them, 60 startups appeared, and later on, only ten startups have chosen
for the final. The competition lasts nine days. For startups training, it takes four months.
After that, only 10 or 6 startups' ideas last within the market. The problem he found out
is that Myanmar had many complicated problems that needed to be solved. However, the
startup's team wants to solve the problems that they faced. As mentioned above, some
significant areas need to be solved, like the healthcare sector, where they are facing a
shortage of doctors and waste management.
He mentioned that Phandeeyar is based in Myanmar, and the founder is David, an

Australian, and he started it only for Myanmar since the market appeared quickly after
2012. Phandeeyar invest, organize, and find investors for startups through pitching.
Investors are from other countries, so startups founders need to be trained to pitch well in
front of international investors. He said that local investors are not interested in investing
in tech-sector since it has high risk. He said that 90% of tech startups in Myanmar are
failed due to the challenges based on their stage. Seed investment is also difficult to get.
Mostly they need USD 30,000 or 40, 000 to expand to the next level. It is more
complicated to get funding of USD 100,000, and they can get mainly from foreign
countries. For startups, he mentioned that hiring is also tricky since there are a limited
number of talents in the market if they want to expand from 5, 6 people to 30, 40 people.
As for the failure factor, he said that if the founder does not have domain expertise
or if they cannot go fast in the market, they failed. Another factor of their failure is that it
is difficult to change an idea into tech since they stuck only on Facebook to advertise and
sell, so it is excruciating for the idea. Another failure is that it depends on the market. If
the product is not strong enough and it died in the early stage. Furthermore, if they do not
get any investment, then they cannot survive. He said as, for E-learning companies, they
do not come to the platform, and they just stuck in Facebook messaging and phone inquiry.
For Phandeeyar, they invested in potential tech-startups. For example, flexible

pass, but they reach to ceiling point, and they stop at one portion, so they need to expand
to other markets if they want to become billion-dollar startups since they mainly target
the local platform. However, for software companies, it is easy to go to a foreign market,
but there are just a few companies in the Myanmar market. Reflecting on four years of
experiences of Myanmar internet infrastructure development, Phandeeyar encouraged
software developers to become startups. Nevertheless, most software professionals, they
do not know about doing startups. For a tech startup, the founder is the most important
for a startup to survive. For some founders, although they said they are Tech-startups,
they work on the phone, and they need to get out of this method.
78
The challenge is that people in Myanmar have limited knowledge to use apps. The
prominent factor is that people in Myanmar are familiar with Facebook since Facebook,
smartphone and mobile internet appeared at the same time, so they do not have the
experience to use google to search for information. Phandeeyar invested in 16 startups
within four years, and now only 5 or 6 startups remained in the market, and he said that
first-mover advantage is vital to get full market coverage and startups need to have exit
strategy and strategies to fight against competitors. He also mentioned that it is not easy
to know how many startups in Myanmar since some companies registered in Singapore
so that they can get easy access to get funding.
3.2 Seedstar
According to an interview with Mo, manager at Seedstar, he said Seedstar focuses

on broader and bigger innovative technology and creative companies by providing a
startup hub with a creative platform and co-working space.
They mainly focus on tech-startups and capacity building for those startups. In
Myanmar, promising startups are in the market, but they need to reach a level to run
sustainably in the market. They provide a platform for startups to collaborate and a
platform that startups can facilitate their selves. Seedstar has two programs, an investment
program, and an academy program. Startups also get benefits from the network that
Seedstar provides by narrowing down their challenges. CB bank is the primary space
partner of Seedstar, and they co-operate together with startups and fintech. In order to
understand the tech startups sector, they work together with the government since the
government understands the context that they do.
3.3 Bindez
Mr. Ye Wint Ko said that when telecom companies entered into the Myanmar
market, he was in Singapore, and he started Bindez with his friend. He graduated BIT in
Myanmar but UK accreditation training school. He worked in a government partner
business in Singapore, Malaysia, and Vietnam. He came back to Myanmar in 2014. They
created the Myanmar language search engine, which is like google. At the same time,
they provided content creating service and reproduced insights for businesses. In 2015,
they got investment from 500 startups, which is based in California, and it is one of the
most popular investment group. In 2016, he got more investment. What they provide to
businesses is to interpret information and customers' comments on social media and
estimate customer behavior. Then, they produce a report based on the information they
acquired on social media. There are 30 employees in their company, and their operation
is in Myanmar, but they register their company in Singapore. He said that the challenges
that his company faced are that the market is still in the early stage, and most businesses
do not understand what they can do with business intelligence, market intelligence,
insights, and data analysis. He mentioned that family businesses do not understand these
tools, and they decide on their opinion. Most of them do not know how to start the process,
and they do not have a standard operating procedure, and they do not have any knowledge
to use data on social media.
79
When they first entered that market, the market was not ready at that time, and it
was a big challenge for them since their service is unique and entirely new. He also
explained that the company's competitors are from foreign countries, but they can
compete as their strength is that they know the language compared to competitors since
competitors do not understand Myanmar language so that they cannot give an accurate
figure. He compared with foreign companies since foreign companies have trillion
revenues so that he needed to find investors. He said only risk seekers invested in their
business. He also mentioned that as for Myanmar banks, they lend money to those who
do not want money. As for tech startups, they have the software, so it is not easy to get a
loan from banks. The only way that they can do is finding investors and it is a big
challenge for them. Another issue is lack of human resources in the market and they faced
with difficulties for finding talents. They have 20 clients-retainers with one-year contract,
especially banks, telecom and corporate businesses. He said that when he entered into
that market, he saw only one competitor in local.
Foreign competitors have different services, and they even do not have a brand
name. They support their service from overseas, but he saw that it was not an effective
way. Another challenge was that there was no big corporation giving these kinds of
service to educate the importance of data. He said that his company alone cannot educate
market since market is not mature. Local and foreign corporate businesses use their
services like Telenor, Huawei, Samsung. His company future plan is to expand to regional
market like Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam as a plan, but he still does not know
which service he should give. He said he benchmark Russia, Norway. Internet service
and companies from Thailand as their marketing is creative and having analytical skills.
But he said his company needs to face with culture and language barrier so that difficult
to penetrate in other market in other countries. He also explained about investors. In 2015
and 2016, angle investors appeared, but they do not think like real investors, and they
want to see short term plans, and he defined them as so-called investors. In 2016, more
investors appeared, mainly they are from banks, but there are only a few investments in
tech sector, and it is less than 1%. But foreign investors invested in it. At that time, the
awareness of people increased, and Generation Z use more than one social media so other
platforms are needed to be tested. Online shopping was started to famous, and property
market, car market, Agri tech-business such as indoor plants appeared based on market
changes. He said he forecasted that e-commerce, transportation, fintech, and Agri tech
business would boom in the future. He mentioned that the founder's commitment is
essential in tech-startups. Realistically, startups need to pass over the dead valley. If they
give up at that time when there is no more client and no funding, they will fail. If startups
can cross that step, then they can survive. Some founders think that startup is just a side
business, and they do not care much about the success rate. If one strategy does not work,
then they need to change. Starting from 2016, He found out that many people cannot use
a computer, so he said that he changed his business model forecasting more on B2B
business since their search engine did not work for people since their behavior is just
sharing application through Zapya app without upgrading them. Due to this, he said if
some error occurs, they cannot fix their application so that the business model has
changed to B2B.
80
3.4 Flexible Pass

Mr. Sully Bholat, the founder of the Flexible pass, he got a BBM degree from the
University of Queensland. His COO, Ms. Win Lae, studied at National Management
College, abe the U.K., and Social entrepreneurship in America. She got an international
business management master’s degree in Paris. He said when he came back to Myanmar,
he had a desire to start his own business so that he was looking for opportunities, and he
found out that the tech startup industry was booming in 2016 and saw opportunity in
fitness industry. So, he developed his business idea and competed in Phandeeyar startups
program. He inspired Class Pass, U.S. based tech startup that uses a subscription model.
He took the concept but different business models by localizing it. Since people in
Myanmar are using mobile phone widely and use prepaid phone bill, his model is that
buying gym point packages through phone bills. One point costs one dollar.
As he explained, the prepaid package is valid for six months, and when customers
go to the gym that has an agreement with the Flexible pass, then flexible pass deducts
points from the prepaid package. If customers extend their package, then the balance can
carry to the next six months. He said he partners mostly with gym and stress relaxation
activities. As Location wide, the Flexible pass has over 120 partners. In early 2019, he
said he expanded his market to Mandalay. Flexible pass now has more than 20 categories
and over 1000 users and over 2500 bookings per month. He said partners increase over
time since he launched Flexible pass over two years. The challenges he faced are that
industry partnership is complicated for the first 6 or 7 months, and it consistently grows.
The second challenge is getting funding since his idea is new in the Myanmar
market, and it is not easy to attract investors since the market is not ready. There are walk-
in customers at gyms, but he said flexible pass price is quite reasonable. Their application
has an easy user interface in which customers can quickly check the accessibility of the
place, time, and features that customers can quickly go anywhere and use gym activities.
Another challenge is the human resource talent problem. There are 13 employees aged
between 18 to 25 who are interested in tech-startups, and flexible pass also has an in-
house tech team. He mentioned that the right person is difficult to find. He got funding
for the first round and the second round from 4 or 5 investors. They are mostly from
Singapore and some angel investors so that he is ready to start by focusing on the
Myanmar market only. However, he will expand lifestyle categories; fitness, spa, and
beauty industry. He explained that 2016 could be called the third wave of tech startups,
and some founding team is not strong enough so that some of them die. However, he
hopes more tech startups will enter into the market. At some point, they need investment
support. He also mentioned that what tech startups need are network and connections.
Within two years, only a few numbers of tech startups will remain in the market because
it is difficult to handle financially and stressful to estimate whether their idea is alive or
not. If they can pass that barrier, then they can survive. He also explained that the
Myanmar tech startup journey, the first wave was in 2012, and tech startups at that time
are popular now. In 2016 was the second wave and on-demand services were popular.
Nevertheless, in 2018 and 2019, tech startups focus more on niche markets as a third
wave.
81
Later on, service-related tech startups will appear more than now. One of his
strategies to get connection and funding is that he frequently competed in competition at
both local and regional levels so that he can expand his network regionally, and he can
contribute a lot to his business. He also mentioned that it is challenging to balance
operations and getting a network at the same time. At this point, commitment is needed.
Now he focuses more on expatriates who use google so that they created a quality website.
His company also have Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube channel by collaborating with
influencers since he moves on video creation as a digital marketing tool to attract users.
He said his company also uses offline marketing tool by participating in events where
they can introduce brand awareness.
3.5 GoP
When interviewing Mr. Nyunt Win Aung, a founder of GoP, he said that he started
GoP in April 2016. His major is Industrial chemistry, and he studied IADCS (U.K
accreditated program). He said he is a tech expert, but he did not focus on what he has
created. He got an idea to create a search engine for planning trips easily, and he
participated in the Telenor program, so he and his friends attended training in Bangkok
based on this program, and they got pre-seed funding up to USD 50, 000. However, the
negotiation was not going well, and he found out the Phandeeyar program and got USD
25,000.
The challenges he mentioned are that the customer journey is not that simple. As
he is techie, his team emphasized developing applications since they are developers, but
later on, he found out that it is not that useful since many people use Facebook, and they
are not familiar with apps. Another one is a payment problem, but now they are using
mobile banking, which is quite convenient. He said that there were four founders at first,
but two founders left since startup business is not a comfortable journey. He also got
grants from ADB as USD10,000. He has a plan to expand more in the Mekong region.
Customers are from aged 25 to 35, and there are 3000 customers in total. Mostly
customers communicate through Facebook, and the website is just as a learning page, but
booking comes from the website rather than apps, and the website is mobile friendly.
Their income source is mainly commission from car rental, hotel, and tour guides. He
said the sustainability of a business is not difficult, but growth matters. In order to survive,
he also has other business called Venus lab in which they write software and Gaming.
Although the internet is good, the challenge is that people think Facebook is the internet,
and they find things through Facebook rather than google. So, his strategy is creating
pages on Facebook in order to find GoP easily.
As for the Bus line, real-time is essential, so they use mobile banking. According
to consumer behavior, people do not want to pay cash immediately for travel. His
company offers both inbound and outbound tour services with customized packages
targeting the young generation. He provides instant-reply service with messenger bot and
machine learning bot, which need natural language processing and takes time. They also
use conditional replies, but the customer journey is not that simple, and 90% of users
come from Facebook and click on the website link. There are very few people to use from
apps. There are five employees in his business. For software business, he provides
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services for local and China, but he focuses Gaming on local. For software, He just started
in October 2018, and there are six customers, but revenue is high, and there are 14
employees in the software business. He mentioned that the crucial elements of the
sustainable startup business are product, market, founder, and market fit. He said he uses
lean strategy since it is practical and he prototype, test, and measure.
3.6 MMtutor
Mr. Wai Phyo Aung, the founder of Mmtutor, said it is started with three founders.
All the founders are marine university students who also work as part-timers and teach as
a study guide. He said he later teaches mathematics mainly. During the time as a study
guide, they found challenges of their time limitation. He said when parents request more
time from him, it is difficult to find tutors within his network, and he did not have access
to an extensive teacher network, so that he thinks teachers were losing their benefits when
parents asked him to introduce. Then he found two co-founders who have the same
passion for tackling that problem. First, he trained his students to become tutors and
connect with parents. At first, they started with a phone and made a list in the book. Later
on, he got a full-time job, so he worked it as a side job. In 2017, he found out Phandeeyar
and got an idea to combine this with tech, so he competed in tech startup challenge. He
got first runner-up, so he thought it might be successful in the future.
He started with funding he got from the prize. As all founding team members
have a corporate job, COO is sale and marketing executive, and another one is digital
marketing officer. If they join the accelerator program, they need to give up a full-time
job. They got a hard time to quit the corporate job since the facilities are excellent. Finally,
he resigned from his job, and later on, his two founders resigned and focused only on
their business. First, he got 25,000 USD from the accelerator program, and he raised funds
from the money he got from his corporate job. He calculated risk when he first created a
business plan and also hoped for the worst thing. They brainstormed many scenarios,
whether they can survive or not. He said that the challenges that he faced are based on
two factors. Internally, as he is a founder and he like micromanaging, so it is difficult for
him. Externally, HR is a big challenge since it is challenging to find talent since the start
and till now. Another one is job market education for their service since they are the first
tech company to introduce this service. They want to go through quality. Parents respect
teachers, and he set rules and regulations for both sides. He offered training to tutors about
child psychology, and for parents, he provides a progress report by localizing it. He
imitates format from one of Singapore's school's report systems to access children's
education status, and tutors need to report children's situation. If children have no
attention to study, he provides consultation to parents free of charge. Sometimes, the
teacher can influence, so they do not need to consult. They are not just a broker model.
They give services for consultation. As for website improvement, he hired a

developer, but he can draw a design. Later on, he employed in house team, but for apps,
they outsourced. Currently, they have 13 employees. Mainly they get customers from
Facebook, and there are 200 active customers monthly, and the total number is 600
customers. They charged service fees to tutors based on pay and experiences, a minimum
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of 10% to a maximum of 13%. They also provide curriculum for language training, but
some, they customized curriculum and put teaching materials. They benchmark similar
businesses, but they focus on learning technology. Localization is a bit difficult since
Myanmar is diverse. For investment is it depends. He currently has funding. As for
expansion, he will focus more on another territory within Myanmar, and he will focus
only on the Myanmar market. For the international market, he said he still needs skills
and capabilities, so he wants to be successful in local only.
3.7 Zeddite
There are four founders in this tech-startup. When customers complain, they solve
problems. Their application is under developing stage. Their customers are middle-aged
people who do not know how to use applications. As a marketing tool, they participated
in the expo. The inspiration he got is that he competed for an idea competition at
Phandeeyar in 2017, and he got motivation as a starting point. In 2017, Uber and Grab
entered into Myanmar market, and he got the idea based on analyzing the business model
that uber and grab used. He started finding problems to solve in the market. As his
background is an electrical engineer, he found out that it is not easy to call a service center
for air-conditioning, fridge, and other electrical maintenance, and it is not easy to find the
nearest service center.
Service center does not have a separate staff to receive an order, and they could
not reach on time, and when the problem happens again, it is challenging to call the
service center again, and there is no guarantee that customers do not know the location of
service center. Sometimes, technicians take air-condition to their service center and when
they change address, it is a big issue for customers to find out the new service center. He
found out that there is no organized system to accept this order. He referenced uber
business model to utilize and localize it and start the business. Challenges he faced are
that finding co-founder and seeds capital. In Myanmar, many founders start with
motivation. If there are no work experiences, they found many difficulties finding co-
founder, human resource for finding skillful employees. They also employ interns, and it
is not easy to choose who to hire if they do not have any experience, and they need to
read to learn how to hire.
Another point is seed capital and according to Myanmar culture, parents support
to start business. There are only a few groups who provide seed capital. Government
asked them to register but they do not know clearly about what government provide and
how to handle taxation. He shared office in Seedstars and he need to pay per chair and
one chair costs USD 70 as a co-working space. It is vital for him to get government
support, space as an early stage, and get the right co-founder. In comparison with other
countries, he referenced the highest standard to analyze their business. He and his team
study Gojek and WeChat on-demand place for the business model as a case study. It is
difficult to predict the industry that he enters. But he said he cannot leapfrog for payment
system. He said many startups know the process but difficult to predict where to leapfrog,
and they can only predict short-term and long-term, and it depends on policymakers.
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However, if all the users can easily use a smartphone rather than depending on
Facebook, they can leap the payment system on e-commerce. Generally, everybody needs
to have knowledge prosperity and payment system for synchronizing with other devices
and knowledge. He mentioned that he cannot take only one reference on one tech startup.
As for education, he got a degree only in Myanmar as an electrical engineer. He does not
have any foreign experiences, but he has passion and spirit since he was young. But he
joined tech startups forums once in Japan and joined other forums in other countries and
his interest is SDG. He said He would focus only on the local on-demand market platform
since it is challenging to penetrate the regional level. First, he will focus only on Myanmar
in order to fulfill customers' requirements. For investors, there are many angel investors
in the regional area, and it is not difficult to find them if they are interested in the idea
that the startup's pitch. It is crucial how to sell their business and show track record. They
can find online and easy to connect. However, the difficulty is that setting up capital in
the early stage before they contact to angle investor. Traditional investors are not familiar
with tech-startups, and ROI calculation does not align with their business as tech startups
are in the stage of the virgin market and early stage.
3.8 Nexlabs
The founder of Nexlabs, Mr. Ye Myat Min, was a freelance developer, and he
studied in Singapore. At first, he started this business alone, but he could not handle that
much, and he found co-founders. After that, he realized he needed to form a small team
in Yangon as a development team. When Myanmar was open up, he found investors to
invest in his business. He said he focuses not just technology but also digital marketing
now. His founding team has four members, but they are weak in operation since they all
are techies. He said the challenge is that he and his team did not know how to manage the
funding they got. Another factor is hiring, they did not know how to hire an employee,
and they were weak in company operations. He said he could not find talents that he
needed since his company entered the market in the early stage. For all capital run by his
company is raised by regional investors from Singapore. He explained that the primary
focus of his company is SMEs and Large enterprises in Myanmar. For the regional market,
the company provides services mainly to Singapore, Malaysia, and Indonesia as
international clients. There are approximately 120 to 130 clients. What he sees about
Myanmar tech-startups environment is that the ecosystem needs to develop more. He said
he noticed that many startups, incubators, and investors enter into the Myanmar market
within 3 or 4 years, but compared to other countries, he assumes that it is still pre-mature
stage. He suggests from the investor's point of view that potential companies are
challenging to find since most of them are weak in operation, and the idea itself cannot
work alone. In order to get investment, he said tech, business and operation are needed to
run smoothly.
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3.9 Project Win

Project Win founder Win Ko Ko Aung has a strong inspiration on the internet
since he was young, and he graduated in Myanmar. Before he created a video blog, he
formed a micro startup that is internet-based. Using the internet, he believes that it has
full visibility anywhere and is a cost-effective business. He launched a science magazine
with his friends, and it was quite successful, with over 3000 users download not just from
local, but later, he and his friends stop operation. After that, he got a scholarship from the
U.S YSELI program and Israel startups program. He said he was lucky enough to get
these experiences. He also said that he is on the right track to get experiences, and he
wanted to share his experiences through video. After his scholarship journey, He created
a video blog channel. He said that people need practical tips in real life, so he decided to
offer his experiences to youth and how he handled challenges. Youngsters like his video,
and they commented that his videos are authentic. He explained why he got an idea to
create a video blog is that the product cycle is long for video instead of writing a blog.
He said he got social capital from a wide variety of areas. He created a street smart online
course, and he felt that it has a positive impact on society. He shared international
experiences, and he said that bragging is more for most influencers in this country. He
said his video blog reached 120000 followers, and 76% is 24 years old. He got revenue
streams from online courses, seminars, offline training, and consultations. He will create
a new revenue channel after he gets 4 million views on his videos, launch a Facebook ads
breaker, and premium video with ads, and he will get revenue from an advertisement in
his video. He focuses mainly on Myanmar youth in the South East Asia region and plans
to expand around the globe. In his video, he gives tips by using Myanmar language and
Myanmar subtitle. The next step is to expand business in Media production, which can
also expand to foreign countries, but he does not have the capability yet because of limited
human resources and talents. His vision is global outreach to Myanmar people.
3.10 Potato Creative
Mr. William is grown up in Singapore, and he got a master’s degree in business

administration. His background is IT. At first, he did not have any plan to move back to
Myanmar. However, in 2016, He came back to Myanmar. When he created a design, he
got an idea and saw the power of IT and his strengths in design. So, he cooperated with
his strength and IT to form potato creative. Before he started potato creative, he formed
the first startup but failed because he did not have any experience. In 2018, he expanded
Potato strategic holding, Two tech startups, and two non-tech startups.
One is event insiders, a joint venture with one agency ticketing site by cooperating
with others. Another one is the media platform. In 2019, he focused more on digital, social
media background API tools, and he incubates them. Then he formed potato creative. The
main challenge that he faced is the government taxation system, and he does not
understand well since it is complicated. As for human resources, he needs to train them
and retain them as brain drain is a big challenge. They do not have high skills, and it stuck
halfway. There are six employees in his team, and if the team is significant, it is not easy
to control them. He said he has both local and international clients from Italy, Netherlands,
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Singapore, and more than 150 clients. He targeted the international market, and mostly
his projects are from foreign countries.
His strategy is different from other agencies since he cooperates with a competitor
agency and accepts outsourcing. The concept is that if he cannot handle his project, he
gives it to another agency to reduce competition. Typically, agencies are fighting against
each other to get clients. He created an agency partnership program, and he opens
everything for his partner agency as a co-creation. In 2018, he needed to do marketing by
himself, so it was tiring, and he could not fight with big agencies. However, when he
cooperated with them, he got projects when big agencies outsource him. The capital
investment is his capital. He said that he started this business with only $400. He resigned
from his job and registered his company at only $200. He started his company through
the Phandeeyar program, but he changed to Seedstars later since they have a more
attractive investment program as he can find foreign investments.
For sustainability, he realized that he could not do alone, and he needs investment
and partners since a different perspective is needed. Although he gets revenue, he needs
to expand the business. He benchmarks US-based companies. He customized software
based on client needs. ERP, accounting, and he does not focus on only one software. His
business is only B2B. Different agencies have different expectations, and responsibility
is quite strict. He said he doesn’t have capability to expand to other countries. However,
better to cooperate with other agents in other countries, so he gets a project, and he can
build a portfolio by collaborating with other countries. He said he is not satisfied with
internet industry as he thinks leapfrogging cannot find solutions and it is good to go step
by step. High techs still cannot use it in the agency. It depends on infrastructure, and it is
crucial to have skilled startups founders and human resources are important.
3.11 E-voucher
When interviewing Mr. Htet Will, the founder of E-voucher, he said he focuses
on product technology and sells a consumer product named E-voucher. For generating
e-voucher in shops, it is challenging to operate with computers since the shop owner
needs to hire a new employee to handle this so, they have barriers. As a typical shop, the
shop owner can use a smartphone instead of a computer to generate an e-voucher to
overcome the technology barrier. In smartphones, they need to install an application. In
2019, everybody had a smartphone so that everybody can generate vouchers by using his
e-voucher technology and device. He graduated in Myanmar, and he did not study oversea.
However, he studied IT at the University of Greenwich program in Myanmar for three
years. Challenges that he faced are that in 2013, it was a financial challenge. Myanmar
needs to highlight opportunities to attract investors. However, investors invest in a big
market, but for tech-startups, they do not want to invest heavily. For tech-startups, they
need to have a passion and accept challenges. He said experiences are essential. There
are two full-time and two part-time employees in the Mandalay office. However, in
Yangon, there are 5 or 6 employees in his company. He sold a voucher generating device
at $300 and launched in the market in December 2016. Every day, 100 businesses use his
device actively since he breaks the technology barrier and enables user-friendly
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smartphone technology. Most customers are SMEs, and people who do not want to use a
computer.
Nevertheless, if they use a computer, it is not easy to control HR. They need to
hire a person who can operate a computer, and it is not easy to control them. However,
everybody can use the phone quickly. So, he focuses on the excellent utility of a
smartphone. His business covered mostly all the regions in Myanmar as his product is the
most cost-effective one. He imported the device from China, but he changed technology
in order to fit with every phone. He created software technology by using Myanmar
language. Customers can also customize by putting their shop names, and software is the
heart of e-voucher. He has cash on delivery service, and the customer service call center
is a 24/7 hotline. His team can train users on how to operate the device via phone, or if
they need more, they use social media channels by using Viber, Messenger. The call
center is beneficial, and it is an effective one, he said. Within 45 minutes, his team can
train them. Customers can ask on time so they can use it effectively if they have problems,
they can get immediate feedback. Although the software is the heart of his device, he does
not sell software. Instead, he sells a device. However, if customers want more features,
he has a premium program, and he sells it at $80. He said he discovered that strategy after
three years later. He said HR is very interesting, and resources are minimal, and he is
facing with talent problem. He invested his finance since he entered the existing market,
so, within six months, he could sell one device and operate well after that. He realized
that market needs a lower price and a simple user interface. So, he created a sales pattern,
cash flow positive, and organic growth. He said he does not need any investment at this
stage.
However, he might need investment if he expands to Inventory management, sales

management, and tracking management system for the next stage. Currently, he focuses
only on sale management. He found out that he started with a monthly subscription, and
it was a mistake. He could not sell his device. He listened to customers' feedback that
they do not like subscription-based and are not familiar with that. So, he decided not to
sell software and sell the device which he ordered from Ali express. It takes two weeks,
and it costs $120, but customers do not want to wait. His business model was complicated,
and later on, he found out that it is difficult for customers. So, he changed to sell with a
one-time payment and selling device through promotion. If the pricing model is wrong,
it does not work. In the second year, he put a premium feature. They can put a restaurant
name, tax, etc. Subscription is not ready for the Myanmar market. For printed paper, he
uses thermal paper to supply his customers, and he supported a one-stop solution for his
customers. He always listens to what his customers need. Later on, he will do micro-
financing by cooperating with banks so that his customers can get benefit by using his
software.
3.12 Pearl Yadanar
With her lecturer from computer university, Ms. Ye Lei Soe started Pearl Yadanar
as a training class mainly in programming, database, software engineering, and then
software development. She competed in the Israel startups program and got a prize for
her production management system in 2016. Her company provides both software
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development and training programs. Moreover, they have classes for Japan IT pass the
exam, including both theory and practice of fundamental engineering. Before operating
Pearl Yadanar, she applied for a job as a programmer, but she did not get it, so she applied
as a teacher and met with her lecturer. They got the idea to open a training school.
On the other hand, they provide customized software development services and
sell product production software. They invested their finance, and they need funding for
their plan. They invest money from training to software development so that they can
survive in business. It takes three and a half months for the training period, and currently,
they have 20 people. For software, there are 20 customers. They also have an internship
program for a final year, and they accept five students per company by providing
internship training and give them real projects. In 2018, there were 63 students and 99
students this year in 2019. They provide three months internship program once a year.
The challenges they faced are financial needs and human resources. Sometimes, they
suffered from a money shortage. For employees, after they trained them and worked
together with them, but within six months, they quit, and they need to start over training
again. So later on, they tried to retain employees and stand on their side by giving leave
when employees want to go back home.
Moreover, if the company is performing better, then they promise their employees
to increase their salary. As for advertisement, they use Facebook and word-of-mouth
marketing for training school, but for software, they go through the network since trust is
essential. She explained that training for preparation and advanced course fees is 540000,
including the course of IT, strategy, management, technology, programming, database,
web design. For software, price depends on user request, and they charge for new features
and maintenance. They focus only on the Myanmar market, and they said they still cannot
enter into the international market.
3.13 Ed-Tech
Mr. Peter, the CEO of Ed-tech, said he started this company when the market has
boomed. There are three funding partners, one technician, one COO and CEO, himself.
He said before 2010, there were no tech startups, but when telecom enter, startup appeared.
At that time, he started his idea from the idea box incubation center. At first, he did not
know what startup is, how to pitch, and business model canvas training. What he has is
IT skills, and he can develop apps. Later, he found out Seedstar, a Swiss-based company,
and he participated in the competition of 65 countries, and he was invited to Switzerland
in 2016. At there, investors from the whole world, including CEO and COO, mentored
them. Starting from this point, he entered into a startup business. He has a passion for
changing education in Myanmar, and he found out the difficulties that they do not have
enough information to decide for a change. So, an information system is needed, a
university information system, a school information system, a platform for connecting
parents, teachers, and students, and he decided to get involved in it.
The challenges that he faced is that when he started working, he said there is little
trust for young people as the main challenge in Myanmar. Other than that, Startups are
facing with HR problem since hard skill is ok, but soft skill cannot find easily, resources
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are scarce, which is the biggest challenge. As most of them lack teamwork and
cooperation, it is difficult to find good EQ skilled labor because of the bad education
system, and that output pushes HR to suffer that challenge, and people do not understand
diversity, and startups are facing most of that since they have limited financial resource.
Since he could not take a loan from a bank, he started his business with investors as it is
difficult to get a loan from the bank due to their required documents and high-interest rate.
He got a network from an investor pitch program, and investors from Singapore invested
in his business. He got seed investment from Myanmar investor, and he did not invest his
funding. He studied in Myanmar, but he worked in Singapore as a web developer. He got
some projects through outsourcing. Before that, there were huge differences between
studying in Foreign countries and studying in Myanmar, but now because of the internet,
there are no differences between accessing education and only personal matters. The
important things are passion, self-learning, focus, and mainly language accessibility. He
cooperated with government universities. There are 20000 application users and ten
private schools using his system. In the system, they can check attendance and their
children's educational background. For university, information system, student focus. He
changed all paper systems to a platform system and even textbook; they can use the
delivery service. Course materials are also involved through sharing platforms to create
a proper system. Most students do not have a laptop, but they all have a smartphone, so
he created apps for easily accessible via phone. For advertising, he uses Facebook channel
and face to face meeting with the university, participates in events since his target market
is small, so he penetrates on events. He will focus just on Myanmar, and the market is
quite big in Myanmar.
However, after he is successful in Myanmar, he will go through the regional

market. LNS by localization. UI/UX and everything is localizing as an advantage. They
can compete with foreign countries if a competitor comes into Myanmar. He said there
are some similar platforms in Myanmar but not the same type as his platform. He said
competition is not that difficult since resources are the same. If the founders work
systematically, their quality is the same as other startups in other countries. For investors,
investors from Singapore and China invest in tech startups but not from Europe and
America. However, if a startup company is a Singapore registered company, they will
invest. However, for his company, it is Myanmar registered company. Investors will not
invest in Myanmar because of political instability. Even he does not know what is going
to happen in 2020, and stability is important. They have a big challenge for political
instability, and it affects hugely for startups. Nowadays, Kanaung hub, Impact hub, Seed
space as a co-working space emerged when startup booming. However, even for the
accelerator, it is not easy to be sustainable and to profit from startups to be sustainable.
They do not know how to get money as a foreign incubator. Nevertheless, Myanmar does
not know how to do, and they do not see opportunities. Myanmar people do not know
how to invest money. For Thailand they are so quick though they start booming at the
same time as Myanmar and government involved seriously. They know how to develop
startup ecosystem and other countries welcome startups. Ecosystem is good. But there is
no ecosystem in Myanmar and foreign involvement is so big. It is better if Myanmar can
run by their own. There is only little investor in Myanmar. As exit strategy, he will sell
to big companies. There is little innovation in Myanmar because of Myanmar's education
system. But he hopes for innovation through imitation, and there is no resource to
innovate.
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3.14 RecyGlo
Ms. Shwe Yamin Oo, the founder of RecyGlo, said she got a bachelor's degree in
Yangon computer university then she helped her family business. In 2012, she studied
ABE because she wanted to know what business is. She is practical. She helped her family
business, but she wanted to start her own business. She started a system for micro SMEs
and offline systems, stock balance, debts, and reports, and they can check through the
phone. So, she found many errors. First, she rented a room for six months. However, she
does not need office since she was selling software, and she found out that she does not
need many people. She opened every bank account, and she produces video, manual book,
and registered key, and she sells it at only$200 for one time, and customers can also buy
monthly payments. She also provides cash on delivery service, but customers do not pay
sometimes. When she was operating business alone, she found many weaknesses,
although decision making was quick. Her background is in IT. So, she started to find co-
founder through the Phandeeyar program. Then she found her co-founders. There are
three founding team members. Mr. Okkar, he knows global culture since he studied
abroad. For her, she is an expert in local.
There are two systems in Phandeeyar, joining other people's idea and self-pitch.
So, she pitched her idea of a recycling business, and RecyGlo is started from the idea
stage. She saw that waste is a problem but there is no one to solve for recycling. She won
the competition and continuously she worked hard. She chose waste management because
she did not think that it is a competition, and she does not have any idea of what she
wanted to be, so she pitched from her heart of what she saw. Phandeeyar supported them.
She needs to communicate with the dumpsite and talk with stakeholders since it is a new
business. As her idea is quite attractive, she got investment from Norway. She got first-
round investment from Phandeeyar, and the second round is from Norway. For foreign
investors, many investors are interested in logistics, impact, IoT, and so on. But there are
only a few investors who want to invest in Myanmar since there are many weaknesses in
politics and infrastructure. As for Phandeeyar, they support tech, community and impact.
She got accelerator funding of USD 25000, 6 months free space and mentors.
After that she found impact investor in January to April 2019, she got second
round from Norway. There are 30 employees and 500 customers using recycling service,
they provide all-in-one service including data- organizations waste consumption, waste
characteristics by providing reports. Awareness Training, shredding confidential data.
Before that they burnt papers but there is no added value. She said the main challenge is
that skilled labor, there is no awareness in Myanmar about waste management. But no
one responsible for waste and how it impacts to the environment. When vacancy
announcements, even parents do not want their sons or daughters to work in a recycling
company, and they do not like startup companies. She mentioned that they should be
proud of impact company. For some people, they think that it is impossible to work in
there. And they though that company might be bankrupt. She needs to take more risks
and giving awareness to the public. Some people do not believe and look down this
recycle business.
The advantage of working in startup is that employees can learn a lot. She said
people's attitude is also not right, and they want to exploit the company's rule, and the HR
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problem is significant, including salary. However, as a startup, they cannot give a high
salary. The second part of the challenge is market. Only foreign-owned companies in
Myanmar are interested in waste management. However, for local companies, they do
not care. So, she changed her business model. Employee motivation is also essential. She
rented a co-working space at Phandeeyar so that employees can see what other people are
doing, availability of resources, networking is good in Phandeeyar so that she can get
connection and advice. One seat is $50 in Phandeeyar. They also develop apps. There are
two business models; B2B is just a dashboard, report, waste conception, etc. Another one
is Oh my trash, C2C model, a platform for buying and selling waste, and it is for the
future forecast. They have a GPS, price, delivery. Some waste collectors, they want to
buy significant volume. She wants to change the habit of waste selling, and she aims to
minimize landfill. She is trying to promote the platform and join Magic Program invited
by the Malaysian government for four months. In the future, she will try to recycle all the
packages and expand her business in Naypyidaw and Mandalay. In Yangon, it is easy to
deal with international companies. However, for Naypyidaw and Mandalay, it is
challenging to deal with traditional companies, but she needs to try to penetrate the market.
3.15 Expa.ai
When interviewing Mr.Swan, a founder of expa.ai, he gives service for Social

media marketing, Facebook page messaging, and Viber to communicate to the brands by
using an automation tool. He is graduated in Myanmar in the area of IT, Engineering IT.
He said customers do not want to wait for their complaints, and they want an instant reply.
His main customers are Samsung and Unilever. They want automated marketing
campaigns, for example, lucky draw. If a customer wins, the user filled up the form
through Messenger, and they fill up money to the customer's phone bill. From a brand
point of view, they know users unlike offline.
Brands can know customer data and personalize marketing tools and promotions.
So, consumers will also get an offer that they like, so they create a win-win situation. He
created automation for both customers and the brand side. How he started is that in 2015,
he quit his job. He started from customer services. He found out that reply from brands is
quite long, so he was not satisfied with that, and he got an idea to create a chatbot. As the
machine needs to understand Myanmar language, he created a natural language engine.
Then he sells this to brands.
His business is an AI startup, and he finished IT, and he studied machine learning,
deep learning. First, he was a freelancer, and he built platforms. Currently, he gives equity
to his friends. Within two years journey, He is the only one operation business. The main
challenges are that he needed to quit his job. First 2 years, his parents did not understand
him and put pressure on him, which is difficult for him. The second challenge is that
taxation difficulties and communication with other companies since other companies take
over his proposals unethically. He said he would not take any funding from investors
since he started with his funding; the growth rate is a little bit slow. However, now, he
has 400 customers. He created AI to understand Myanmar language so that he will focus
on Myanmar only. However, he has a plan to expand to Indonesia and Vietnam in the
future. In that case, he needs to find investors. However, his business is sustainable and
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profitable, so he said he can choose investors that he likes. For example, an international
investor who can help for his business.
3.16 Bards
Mr. Htet Arkar Kyaw, the founder of Bards, said that he created Bards in order to
get funding for Dingar, which is like e-wallet, and banks are also making this mobile
money. However, he found out that Each one is not connected, and it is difficult for shops
and also individual users. So, he created an app to connect all the mobile money by using
one app. The second problem he discovered is that customers order things, but they do
not pick up the phone when the delivery comes. He said he would add more features. He
explained that there are many challenges like there are few supports from government,
education, and community. First, he said he did not know what to do. So, he just started
it, then create a plan, builds products, and talk to customers. Another one is that he did
not have any knowledge of what startups is.
Moreover, funding problems are also visible for startups. It is challenging for
startups to build trust with other businesses since they are quite small and unpopular.
Bards have continuously 5 or 6 customers, and he gives digital marketing service more,
and he has some projects from other countries since labor cost is competitive in U.S and
Egypt. He said Bards is only six months old, and there are 6 to 10 employees in his team.
There are two co-founders in his team, and they support each other. He graduated from
West Yangon Technology university as a civil engineer, and He studied liberal arts at
Parami Institute, and he studied for five months in which he learned creative thinking. He
has an IT background. Retail shops use manual, and he talked with IT firms. Now, he can
write coding.
His investment is his finance. He also talks with an investment firm from
Myanmar, but they are foreign-based. There are investment firms in Myanmar, namely
Venture capital EME (Emerging market entrepreneur), Trust Venture (Japan), or Seed
Myanmar. However, for PE, a private equity firm, they invest in big companies. Daiwa
also invests in big companies. Tech startups are just in an early stage and easy to enter
into the market. If they apply the existing model, then it is easy, but they cannot grow at
the regional level. In Myanmar, users do not understand how to use the internet, but
Facebook is the most influential one since there are more than 22 million Facebook users
in Myanmar. For advertising, He uses only Facebook channel so that it can reach out
quickly. As Bards, he wants to go international. He got some projects with low income
from U.S projects compared to the local market. If there are not many pressures, he
accepts projects to build up a portfolio.
In some cases, he gives free services for influencers as a portfolio building. As a

tech startup, education is not that strong, and accelerators explained, but they do not
understand what real-life problems for founders since they read books and share
knowledge. Because of the internet infrastructure, online classes from the U.S called Y
combinator startup school. He can learn a lot from there as it is excellent that funders are
successors, and their problems are the same as other startups so that he can accept it. For
93
application, it is essential to target specific targets but need to advertise heavily on

Facebook. He commented that only Myanmar education is not enough because there is
no critical thinking. Nevertheless, he joined a private institute so that he gets critical
thinking. Later on, a smartphone is good at CPU, and most of them do not use a computer
so focusing on apps has a great opportunity and he said it is dangerous that they do not
have creative mindset due to weak education system.
3.17 Nextcode/Booking doctor
Mr. Thiha Zaw said he found out that appointments are not ok for patients, and
they need to wait a lot in a clinic, so he started this business in 2017. He also provides
software for the medical record. He found many difficulties in bookings so that he does
not focus more since the doctor’s arrival time is not accurate. He said he focused more
on a patient recording and started in early 2018. He started the system, and a problem he
faced is that standardized electronic medical record. Twenty clinics are using his service.
As for the medical recording system, he explained that there are international standards,
but the main challenge is that there is no standardized system for medical records in
Myanmar, and they need to change according to requirements.
There is an imbalance between patient and doctor ratio. So, it is essential to check
up patients, but they do not want to record due to time limitations. As for the system, the
doctor needs to record their selves. So, time to check the patient is reduced, and their
income reduced, so some doctors focus more on curing patients. For investment, he has
two companies to produce software business. One is Trion technology, with his funding
formed in 2011. Trion technology has three founders, and mostly they sell clinical
software.
Another one is and next code in 2017, and he got funding from Phandeeyar. There
is no co-founder in the Next code. He graduated from Mandalay computer university.
Then he worked as freelance developers. In 2017, Phandeeyar chose him in the
accelerator program, and mainly focused on healthcare software, and his target is
Myanmar only. However, later on, he has a mission to expand to the regional market. He
said he does not find funding aggressively. He pitches investors in the usual way. He can
survive his business. In 2019, he said he would fundraise more. He found local investors
and international investors; he needs to explain a lot. For international investors, there are
investors from Singapore, Hong Kong or China.
3.18 Jobdoh
The company is based in Hongkong, and they focus mainly on HR. Three years
ago, the founders noticed that there are opportunities in Myanmar, and they changed HR
to fintech. They introduced payroll services by cold calling one company, and 100
employees are using this service as a pilot stage. The main challenges are finding talented
employees in the job market. They find good people without experience and train them
up. Especially for developers, it is not easy to find, and they need to change their way of
94
thinking. In the Job marketplace, they are not advertising at the moment. They emphasize
the fintech part, and they cold-call companies. They think it is still small and not growing
very first. Since there are many problems to solve in Myanmar, so it is an excellent
opportunity for startups. In Myanmar, they can still have top people to get for them. The
problems are that peers in the startup space do not have good experiences, access capital,
and infrastructures. All the elements need to support each other, so they think the market
is not ready yet. They have an investor from Hong Kong and Singapore.
3.19 ConceptX
When interviewing Mr. Soe Htet, the founder of concept X, he said he believes
the concept that education can change the world is the most crucial thing in life. Since he
was young, he wanted to contribute to education. He saw that some people do not have
enough money to access higher education. When he studied in the U.S, he learned from
MIT open course since physics and mathematics are difficult. So, he found out that
YouTube lessons are beneficial, and he saw value on that.
When he returned to Myanmar, he realized that he could train only 25 teachers

per class, but he wanted to reach out more. As he discovered that tech is booming in
Myanmar, he decided to run a YouTube channel, and his ultimate goal is free education.
So, he combined tech and what he knew. He focuses on mathematics for grade 12. He
started in February 2018 and officially started in June. He said it is difficult to find
teachers and get time from them since most of their time slot is full. Furthermore, he
mentioned that as a startup, it is difficult to pay more money to famous lecturers, so he
targeted youth to get resources, and he teaches and trains them. He thought it is a
revolution. He put his investment. It is challenging to do mass marketing when they
produce products, and it is difficult to sell. But 70% of his customers are teachers and
there are 200 customers now. He sells one-year subscription apps with only $10. After
that, he changed his business model and he increased price to $30.
In the future, he said he will penetrate with subscription based for selling courses.
He has sale volume, but the amount is quite small, so it is difficult to attract investors. He
doesn’t have any business background so that he learnt from YouTube and he has strong
inspiration on his business. There are 15 employees, and some are part-timer in his
company. He studied what the former startups founder did through YouTube and study
the failure reason of successful founders. Internet infrastructure is one of the most
beneficial assets for him to study what is happening around the world. He is happy with
what he does since it can impact education positively.
3.20 Shopmyar
Mr. Nikolas is a COO of Get as a founding team. He also runs his businesses,
including translations, business consulting, financial plan, business plan, project plan
service on the side. He said the new CEO of Get asked him if he wanted to take on new
challenges in Shopmyar, not as a COO, and he accepted. The founders are Mr. Mike Than
95
Tun, and the CEO is his brother. Shopmyar is an E-commerce platform. They imported
tailored-made products by manufacturing and holding inventories, including electronics,
travel, living, household product, and furniture. They have applications for both IOS and
Android users. However, he said they would rename a new brand since Shopmyar is not
that successful, and there are 80 employees in their team. Mainly, they imported products
from China, and they do not have a brand yet, so they focused on quality. He said they
do campaign to educate customers. For a fan, they bring bladeless technology for a child-
friendly feature. Challenges are that suppliers are not punctual, and they are not promising
as a market behavior. Employees are not skillful and challenging to get quality employees.
He said that there is less learning culture in Myanmar, and most are trying to get an
immediate return. He said his team tried to create a happy environment for employees to
get rid of traditional blaming culture and build a learning culture. Investment is just from
relatives, and there are 300,000 followers and 200 transactions in Shopmyar. All the
founders are graduate from Singapore, and he graduated from the U.S.
3.21 Binary lab
Mr. Aung Lwin, the founder of Binary Labs, studied at Parami Institute, and he
has work experience of working in startups called Oway ride. He found many
opportunities and challenges. He said he is not from a technical background, but he is
interested in IT. He found out to cooperate with IT and business. He went to India to study
the startup ecosystem. So, he believes if all are open up, he can start his business. In
October 2018, he started Binary Lab, and there are many challenges he faces. The
problem he discovered is that companies have tech ideas, but they do not know how to
do it. Most companies have a big website, and they do not know how to maintain and
control it. So, companies outsource them. As an opportunity, he accepts outsourcing,
creating mobile applications, software, and various tech sectors as an outsourcing
company. In Myanmar, there is less support for tech startups’ product ideas and how to
survive in the industry. As for survival, he started Binary labs. On the other side, he
creates new products by using revenue from Binary Labs. There are four founding team
members, three full work time, and one is CTO, but he does not work full-time, and they
have different backgrounds. He said that he is one of the earliest employees in the Oway
ride, and he is interested in the tech business. So, he resigned from his job to study abroad,
but he thought again to study in Myanmar and do his startup. Investment is his investment,
and as an outsourcing company, revenue and working capital are quite good. He is
creating apps for education, and if it is a good response, he will find funding from
investors. His team has 20 employees, and he has both local and international customers
17 clients in number and revenue stream is 50% from local and 50% from international.
His international clients are from Hong Kong and getting ongoing projects.
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3.22 CarsDB
Mr. Wai Phyo Kyaw, the founder of CarsDB, said when he started this platform,
car business was booming in Myanmar at that time. So, he got an idea to create a platform
to trade rather than offline. He started with his investment, and there are three founders
in CarsDB. The challenge that they faced is that it is challenging to educate people, and
internet infrastructure is not good at that time. Today, there are 0.3 million users and 10
million transactions on their website and app. Some investors from Singapore invested in
his business. All founders studied IT in Singapore and worked in Singapore. There are 70
employees in his business. He said he started tech startup early, so he got all the
experiences along seven years' journey, and some Investors and partners come and
communicate them. Through his platform, users can trade used and brand-new cars, car
parts, and accessories. He also organizes auto shows and exhibitions.
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Myanmar - Entrepreneurship and Technology Leapfrogging in Least Developed Countries A Study of Myanmar Tech Startups

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Entrepreneurship and Technology Leapfrogging in Least Developed

Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University

In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of

Master of Business and Administration

5.20 Shopmyar ............................................................................................................ 46

I want to express my special thanks to Professor Rian Baise-Zee, who supervised

me emotional support during my journey of writing this thesis.

Technology leapfrogging, especially internet and mobile technology leapfrogging,

explores cases where technology leapfrogging leads to innovation opportunities for

of the market, and innovative or imitative/localized opportunities of the market (demand)

entrepreneurs, the background of entrepreneurs' work experiences and education,

entrepreneurial self-efficacy, the importance of accelerators/incubators, and technology

readiness of the Myanmar market. By identifying the characteristics of leapfrogged

entrepreneurs and their characteristics based on education and work experiences

combined with entrepreneurial self-efficacy, talented entrepreneurs bring new

support from accelerators to drive their startups to be successful as a supply-side.

Technology readiness is intermediary to identify innovation or imitation/localization of

leapfrogging in information and telecommunications technology will lead to innovation.

international exposure through their startups by attending conferences and workshops in

up with technology. Accelerators support them by providing mentorship, networking, and

narrow. Therefore, most startups cannot capitalize on current opportunities. However,

combining the necessary infrastructure to implement a narrow market opportunity. Thus,

Generally, the term leapfrogging is used mostly in businesses, economics, and

the world and its citizens communicate. Leapfrogging refers to “a non-continuous

countries and developing countries, including Myanmar. Advanced technology is

introduced and utilized in developed countries, especially internet technology while

developing countries still do not get full access to the internet.

When internet technology is adopted quickly in developing countries, Davison et

al. (2000) mentions that developing countries have an incompatibility between

according to the absorptive capacity of developing countries, and some developing

to enhance technology readiness.

Information and communication technology (ICT) has a vital role in leapfrogging

telecommunication infrastructure in developing countries is a lot cheaper and accessible,

products and services such as e-commerce, fintech, healthcare, education, payment

system, logistics, and supply chain, transportation, wellness, beauty. According to

mobile technology to run their business successfully. It is an excellent example of

leapfrogging since Myanmar leapfrogged mobile-generation technology in 2013. Within

same mobile infrastructure (3G,4G) as developed countries. The technology and

then capitalizing on it by providing original solutions.

by opening up Myanmar innovation center and incubators/accelerators support to develop

startups. Some co-working spaces appeared to boost startups' environment. Nevertheless,

innovative opportunities for startups. However, a counterargument is that if other

entrepreneurs do appear in this situation having the background of international education

and work experiences with strong entrepreneurial self-efficacy as a characteristic of

leapfrogged entrepreneurs. Also, accelerators play an important role to emerge many

startups by supporting them with mentorship, networking opportunities and co-working

The objectives of this research are to identify the characteristics of leapfrogged

what challenges do they encounter? Does technology leapfrogging lead to market

Chapter II: Literature review

2.1 Technology Startups

According to Mulas et al. (2018), a startup is defined as “a newly established

organizations supporting or connecting to these startups, interacting in multiple

scope, founders’ marketing experiences, financial resources, and founders’ industry

startups is because of lack of finance, lack of technology, team management problems,

Harrison et al. (2004) argues that “bootstrapping is a way of life in entrepreneurial

support mechanism, human resource challenges, and environmental elements.

According to McKinsey (as cited in Friedl & D’hauwers, 2014, p. 6) consultancy

entrepreneurial ecosystem has been leapfrogged to get a better IT infrastructure.

2.2 Technology Leapfrogging and Catching Up in ICT

According to leapfrog digital strategies, leapfrogging is the concept that areas,

2019). As for technological leapfrogging in the area of telecommunication, Antonelli

competitiveness. Additionally, Davison et al. (2000) argue that technology leapfrogging

is to utilize IT for accelerating development and economic growth. As for technology